the [chestnut] hills

Living in Boston and being unemployed is similar to living on Long Island and being unemployed. My mind is given the freedom to roam about and dwell on any particular topic for as long as it pleases. Thank god I'm starting school in January. Until then, here are some deep thoughts...

On Pop Culture:
My roommate and I were trying to figure out what a TV show about our life somewhat resembling the hills would be called...the Beacon Hills? the Chestnut Hills? the Fanueil Halls? Anyway, it will come to me eventually and one day you'll see me on your fancy flat screen with an obvious caption of my place in the made-for-tv hierarchy like "Rachel's Roommate" or "so and so's girlfriend." That will be the day. I am still working on a very convincing, "so what did you do last night?"


On Boston:
You know what? People on the T reeeeally like to eat disgusting and extremely smelly fast food in close proximity to my face. Maybe it's that girls in Montreal just don't eat, but never have I smelled so much greasy food in enclosed spaces than I have on the T. I did see a guy eating a hard-boiled egg on a bus in Montreal once, which may be plain strange, but it did not stink up a joint like super size french fries do. It's rude, it's kind of gross because who knows how dirty the T is, and honestly food should not be an afterthought.

In relation to that, I have also noticed that many Bostonians have no problem eating at mass chain restaurants...like, you live in a city, maybe skip Pizzeria Uno tonight and try something new? There is pretty great food here, trust me. Sometimes I feel like Boston is just a bunch of suburbanites who got lost, ended up in a metropolis, and don't know how to deal with things. Another example, everyone has a car! When I so much as insinuate the prospect of walking somewhere I am often met with glances and an overwhelming "ohh that's right you are from New York." What exactly does that mean anyway?

I don't want to insult anyone and I do kind of enjoy interesting nuances from city to city...which these can certainly be interpreted as...but seriously, stop eating McDonald's on the T.

in montreal.

god, if it wasn't so cold here i would be more apt to all but decide to stay for a while. i miss stimuli. i kind of forgot they existed. i was in starbucks with libby on saturday and while she was on the phone i happily stared at all the people who walked by, all the dogs on leashes, buses, cars, changing lights, everything. i've only been away a month but how i've missed distractions. on long island i have my mind to distract myself, which kind of defeats the purpose of distractions anyway; i'm pretty sure they were designed to remove oneself from one's thoughts. also, the eye candy is spectacular. when i lived here it all seemed so normal to have every other guy that walked down the street be a perfectly bearded specimen that they all but blended into the buildings they passed by. stranded amongst a society whose male population values hair gel and frosted tips above glorious beards, i suddenly realized how lucky i was to get bus crushes almost every time i went to school, cafe crushes when i was out studying, crushes everywhere. apparently i have regressed into the 16 year old version of myself. lovely. maybe soon i'll dig frosted tips again and the cycle will officially repeat itself.

being here has also been strange. packing up my apartment for the umpteenth time, i've become quite the expert but i don't think i have fully come to the realization that this time, my things aren't going to a new apartment, they are going to my basement for over half a year. a means to an end, i keep telling myself. tomorrow night i will be back in suburbia, driving everywhere, baking all the time and most likely wishing i was elsewhere. the grass is always greener...

here we go again...

the food blog is up and running and located at epicurean-adventures.blogspot.com - run by my best friend and fellow foodie, rachel, and myself, it will hopefully prove to be a fruitful product of our time off. not a whole lot's been written yet; i'm in the midst of developing my own sticky bun recipe and hopefully we will whip up a batch of rachel's caramel apple biscotti, a product of her autumn recipe developments. in no time we'll have a bakery-worthy repertoire and no store front from which to sell it. oh well, we are but 22, after all.

also reading bill bryson's new contribution to the vast "who was william shakespeare" library. his has been the most eye-opening not for any new biographical developments but as a non-scholar, bryson lends a sort of realism to shakespeare studies that other scholars tend to neglect. he quotes an unnamed scholar who says "every shakespeare biography is 5 percent fact and 95 percent conjecture." that leaves most scholars with the increasingly difficult task of trying to write new and interesting things about a figure who died 400 years ago and whose biography remains as much of a mystery as ever. that's why we have so many books about horticulture in shakespeare, and "linguistic and informational entropy in othello." basically, it's pretty disheartening. i'm not going to lie, i spent the bulk of my undergraduate years with the idea in mind that i wanted to be a shakespeare prof. it seemed logical enough, i liked studying him and the whole of elizabethan literature and drama the most and what the heck else am i supposed to do with a degree in english besides reluctantly follow in my parents' footsteps as a librarian. granted, i've only been out of school for a month, but i'm already spending most of my time watching food network, wishing i worked at charm city cakes, looking at recipes, and all but completely forgetting that i am applying for grad school. oh yes, it is an identity crisis. i still want to go to grad school, if for nothing more than to know for sure whether or not academia is my calling and to settle somewhere new and possibly more permanent than montreal. don't tell my parents.

upward, onward, and into the kitchen to roast some veggies...

so far:

have made -
- pizza - crust, sauce from scratch; fresh mozzarella and basil on top
- brownies
- cranberry scones
- spicy green beans and kale parmesan
(all over the last two days, haven't kept track of what was made before)
tomorrow - foccaccia!

have:
- rediscovered sleeping past 8am
- staying in pajamas all day - wow! utterly lethargic and wonderful all at the same time
- played with the dog on a daily, often multiple times a day, basis
- started reading bill bryson's "Shakespeare" only to realize that i am not at all ready to be reading about Shakespeare again (possibly not until i start grad school next fall)
- convinced best friend of 16 years to move to boston with me
- remembered i was offered a job at my cousin's restaurant in san francisco for the summer and will most likely e-mail him about said offer
- repeatedly claimed i will exercise to avoid tummy expansion suburbanites are prone to; then remember i have a herniated disc in my back that needs fixing
- found my old camera, one that uses film. wish i remembered what those darn f-stops are.
- sent in 2/7 of my applications
- watched far too much food network

turning into strange, shadow of the urbanite i once was...

introductions.

less than a month ago i was submerged in 80 pages worth of papers, i was in an apartment overlooking parc avenue in montreal, we'd just gotten our first blizzard, and all i wanted to do was leave. montreal is the kind of city that overwhelms you if you let it, and i was too weak to fight back. then it all stopped. the thing with school is that when it ends, it's always less climactic than you think it will be, especially when everyone else finished last may and they're now scattered throughout the world, embarking on futures i haven't had time to think about. i handed in my last exam, met one of my remaining friends for blt's and trotted off to physical therapy. i left the next day.

what happened? you finish college, you eat some sandwiches, and you leave? in december, you do. may is a huge party. december is cold. when i left montreal, i was ready to leave. there was a possibility of returning, but that didn't even excite me as much as the prospect of being elsewhere by september. i got home, celebrated, and then went to see a neurosurgeon about the back pain that i've had for two years. i need surgery, with a month+ recovery. i am not going back to montreal, i am suddenly living in my parents' house on long island. there are rules, no sidewalks, and you have to drive everywhere. there is the prospect of getting better mixed with the fact that i finally have free time and nothing to do with it. i am rachel, interrupted and this blog is an experiment in resourcefulness. let's see what i find to do in this product of the levitt's strange, suburban dream.