Another sleepy Sunday almost gone... for a while I was keeping track of Sundays gone and Sundays yet to come, but I lost track right around when school started getting heavy. I should count them up again, since now that school is heavy and socializing is occasionally blurring the distinction between one day and the next, I have completely lost track of whole weeks. I've been here for over two months! Where the heck did all that time go? Into books and glasses of Belgian beer, that's where it went. Not that I'm bitter, I only regret a few moments here and there--a much better ratio than at many other times in my life. Nonetheless, I wish I had about 60 more hours between today and tomorrow, hours wherein I didn't have to sleep or eat if I didn't want to. So many freakin' constraints, where's the manager! I have something to say about this! (The Young Man in Repetition has a temper tantrum against God at one point, very funny.)

Yesterday Marianne and I went on a hella shopping trip to Antwerp. Originally I had planned to go to a lecture, but I misunderstood the time slot, so I didn't make it. I needed new shoes badly, and I wanted boots so I could wear skirts in the winter. I'm sure I don't have to tell anyone out there how infuriating shopping can be for anyone who doesn't fit the fickle and changing standards of the fashion industry, with whatever mysterious means they have of producing such simple stereotypes. I alternately seethed with indignant rage and sunk into a pit of self-pity and loathing. If anyone out there thinks I'm exagerating, we need to get to know each other better. I HATE shopping. Even when it works I consider it the exception that proves the rule. Such a simple thing on the face of it: find a pair of boots that are both functional and not helatiously or hilariously ugly. I can't even talk about it it makes me so angry-slash-sorry for myself.

The great part about spending the day in Antwerp was really hanging out with Marianne. She staid my nerves and didn't dote on my helplessness, I could follow her along on her missions and still have the courage to stop in every GD boot store in the city. At a few points we got to laughing so hard my sides hurt, so that was another nice counterbalance to my otherwise abyssmal mood. I did get a nice pair of boots from Puma, in the last shop five minutes after they officially closed. I also got a really nice grey jacket that I really like and Marianne gave me a great red scarf that's way warmer than my plain old brown scarf, so really, I made out like a bandit. Antwerp is also really beautiful, I'll go to take pictures sometime. The train station in particular is stunning.

In other news I had a little visitor today, she got off the train and we went around and did stuff and took pictures, here she is having a hot chocolate in the Grote Markt. She's a great guest, doesn't say much, but not everyone's a conversationalist.

Anyhoo... I'm going to have my sleepy Sunday supper now, Indian food, Taj Mahal... again. It's good and cheap, what more can one ask?
At any rate I hope everyone is well and not too busy, it's almost paper writing season again. May God have mercy on us.

Me