prologue: going on a holiday

[above: what i hope to find evidence of on my trip.]

so tomorrow, i'm going on a trip with my family (mother, father, sister, brother-in-law) to the galapagos. on the one hand, who the fuck wouldn't want to go to the origin of the origin of the species, and kayak among the seals, and generally hang out with a bunch of aging nerds on an academic package trip boat that offers lectures, wifi, and fine cuisine.

on the other hand, i am a grown-ass woman going on a trip that costs more than i make in a year (on the books, anyway), so i'm sharing a room with my parents. so i'm basically going to be starring in my own very special episode of "get a life," except at sea. so i might have better hair than chris elliot, but he got to be on letterman back when it fucking ruled, and i get to bring ear plugs so i can sleep through my parents' two part deviated septum harmony.

or maybe i'm more like one of the many lovable losers on this season's primetime schedule, except instead of having a secret superpower that contrasts so nicely with my everydude loser image, i have just have boobs, an arthritic dogs, and debt. all of which i'd gladly trade for a computer brain or service to the devil or whatever horseshit i'll gladly sit through any night of the week (well, keep the dog, lose the arthritis).

anyway, i'm now in boston, where the air is cold and filled with victory (for now, at least, i know, i know). as such, we went out for ice cream, and then my father has bought a youkilis shirt to match my own (viva the jewk!). and please note that the line at jp licks was long as hell, because that's what we do in boston when it gets cold; boston fucking loves ice cream.

[ice cream with jimmies, which is not a racist term, because that makes no fucking sense. f-j care to weigh in on this one? because to make the leap from a set of discriminatory laws to those who said laws discriminated against to their race to the matching color of an ice cream topping seems like a little bit too much of a journey to me. [[and i buy confusion on the west coast when you say jimmies, because jimmy is slang for condom i guess, and i feel much better about inadvertently making people think my ice cream is coated with prophylactics than marchers on selma.]] but whatever, you want jimmies to be racist, go ahead, and also, paul is dead, 9/11 was a conspiracy, and that is the ghost of a little kid in three men and a baby. you got me, you clever genius you.]

like i said, the boat has wifi, and mom got a special waterproof digital camera, as well as uv protectant shirts, a brand new pair of those hideous foot basket watershoes, books about darwin, etc. but as mom prepared in all ways except remembering to bring a bunch of my swimming attire from my nh homestead (who's gonna be swimming in army shorts and discovering the origin of the skin rash? me me me!), the wifi might also be somewhat unreliable. so pictures of seals n'shit might have to wait. and certainly no reviews of gossip girl.

whatever tho, i have to be awake in 6 hours and still haven't packed my own youkilis shirt, cortizone cream, or application to the handsome boy modeling school. woo.