1. The Namesake - Jhumpa Lahiri
2. The Magician's Book: A Skeptic's Adventures in Narnia - Laura Miller
3. Sloppy Firsts - Megan McCafferty
4. About a Boy - Nick Hornby
5. Arthur & George - Julian Barnes
6. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
7. The Last Olympian - Rick Riordan
8. The Virgin's Lover - Philippa Gregory
9. The Yiddish Policemen's Union - Michael Chabon
10. Northanger Abbey - Jane Austen
11. Run - Ann Patchett
12. The Demon's Lexicon - Sarah Rees Brennan
13. Sacred - Dennis Lehane
14. Murder in Mesopotamia - Agatha Christie
15. Hercule Poirot's Christmas - Agatha Christie
16. Death on the Nile - Agatha Christie
17. On Beauty - Zadie Smith
18. The Hollow - Agatha Christie
19. The End of the Alphabet - C.S. Richardson
20. The Mystery of the Blue Train - Agatha Christie
21. Gods Behaving Badly - Marie Phillips
22. Cat Among the Pigeons - Agatha Christie
23. A Complicated Kindness - Miriam Toews
24. The Path of Minor Planets - Andrew Sean Greer
25. The A.B.C. Murders - Agatha Christie
26. The Moving Finger - Agatha Christie
27. The English Patient - Michael Ondaatje
28. Mansfield Park - Jane Austen
29. When You Are Engulfed in Flames - David Sedaris
30. Unaccustomed Earth - Jhumpa Lahiri
31. Her Fearful Symmetry - Audrey Niffenegger
32. Talking It Over - Julian Barnes
33. The Shipping News - Annie Proulx

If you like Keats, doomed love affairs, female characters whom you want to befriend, and/or good movies, please go see Bright Star. I loved it. And if you cry while walking home at night in the rain, then we are the same.

(I like law school and living in Toronto so far. I liked it more when I found out that this one girl (who already seemed nice and everything) wrote her English Honours thesis on John Keats and Fanny Brawne!)

1) I wrote my last final exam as an undergrad last Wednesday. It's so strange to think that it's over.

2) It snowed today and yesterday. It is the end of April and in normal cities, you expect showers or flowers. But I'm trying not to rise to the bait of the crazy weather, because I leave for Europe in three days. I'm going with two friends on the typical post-graduation tour. We're going to Spain, France, Germany and Ireland and I'm really excited to meet people and mangle languages and get lost and eat and eat. Also, to visit the Louvre properly this time, armed with the knowledge gleaned from a couple Art History courses (I have added specific museums to the list of places I want to go based on their collections of artists I love, like Friedrich and David). If anyone wants a postcard, please let me know.

3) I still have to hand in my final copy of my honours thesis. There does not seem to be enough time for the things I need to do before I go, so of course I would visit my favourite political blogs tonight. Let it never be said I didn't learn effective time management skills by this point.

I am almost entirely sure I'm going to law school this fall. However, I'm not sure where to go. I've been accepted at five schools and have narrowed (slightly) the choices to three: the University of Toronto, Columbia and New York University (NYU). I've visited all three schools and, in my opinion, they're all great. I don't think I can make a bad decision - I think I'd be happy at any of them - but I'm kind of afraid of not making the right one.

So, I turn to you, f-list, for advice. Here are the respective advantages:
Toronto:
- the most important academic advantage is that I REALLY want to study Canadian constitutional law, and obviously there's a lot more of that in Canada than in the US (plus, the U of T has a really strong constitutional program, anyway)
- I can still take interesting courses in international law and do international human rights internships
- I have a lot of family in Toronto, and I'd like to spend more time with them
- I have a few friends going to the U of T next year, including one of my closest friends, so we could live together
- It's easier to go from Canada to the US with a JD degree than it is to go the other way
- Tuition is half the price of NYU and Columbia

NYU:
- has the strongest international law program in North America, by most accounts (including amazing internship opportunities and faculty), and I also really want to study international law
- has exchange programs with schools like Oxford and Paris II
- by virtue of being in New York, I'll get opportunities I wouldn't get in Toronto - for example, the UN is there
- there's lots of options for working closely with faculty on current cases or even co-authoring articles
- New York's an awesome place to live
- however, it doesn't have a campus, it's just a collection of buildings

Columbia:
- a really strong all-around program, plus I love the campus
- all the New York-specific advantages NYU has: location, opportunity, etc.
- it gave me a really good feeling when I visited

Half of me thinks U of T (which is generally considered the best law school in Canada) is the best and most sensible option, while the other half wonders whether the opportunity to go to Columbia or NYU is too good to pass up. I was talking to one of my professors about it, and he told me about a conversation he had with his own professor about where he should go for his Ph.D. His professor said, "You can't really do what you want at Oxford, so it seems like you should go to Essex, except for one thing: if you don't go to Oxford, will you wonder what would have happened if you had for the rest of your life?" My professor went to Oxford, realized they had no one there for his political theory interests, and eventually got his Ph.D. elsewhere.

I don't know. It's a little scary for me, trying to peer into a foggy crystal ball and decide where I would be happiest. I'd appreciate any thoughts anyone has to offer.

1. Persuasion - Jane Austen
2. Artemis Fowl - Eoin Colfer
3. 1984 - George Orwell
4. A Reading Diary: A Passionate Reader's Reflections on a Year of Books - Alberto Manguel
5. Remember Me? - Sophie Kinsella
6. Lock & Key - Sarah Dessen
7. Twilight - Stephenie Meyer
8. New Moon - Stephenie Meyer
9. Eclipse - Stephenie Meyer
10. Shelf Monkey - Corey Redekop
11. Nomad's Hotel: Travels in Time and Space - Cees Nooteboom
12. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
13. Eat, Pray, Love - Elizabeth Gilbert
14. Howl's Moving Castle - Diana Wynne Jones
15. Darkness, Take My Hand - Dennis Lehane
16. Prayers for Rain - Dennis Lehane
17. Avalon High - Meg Cabot
18. Cross Channel - Julian Barnes (short stories)
19. Franny and Zooey - J.D. Salinger
20. Weep Not, Child - Ngugi wa Thiongo
21. Dangerous Liaisons - Choderlos de Laclos
22. The Last Summer (of You and Me) - Ann Brashares
23. The Boleyn Inheritance - Philippa Gregory
24. Kabul in Winter: Life Without Peace in Afghanistan - Ann Jones
25. A Great and Terrible Beauty -Libba Bray
26. Prep - Curtis Sittenfeldd

I love snow and winter, I really do, but -25 C (-13 F, according to an online converter) without even factoring in windchill makes me glad I'll be in Palm Springs next Saturday.

In between studying for and writing finals, I'm writing holiday cards. If anyone would like a card from me, I'm screening all comments so you can leave your address there. Or you can email me. I promise they'll all be sent out by Friday, but Canada Post is ridiculously slow so I'm not sure how long they'll take to get around the continent.

Also: has anyone read Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld? I suggested it for my book club (which consists of three of my friends, but we still have an awesome time) for our holiday break book and I don't want to make them read something bad.

Advice I should have given my self of a few days ago: Curb your history geekiness. When you have three term papers due in a span of three days, it's not a good idea to spend so much time researching that you have 40 pages each of research* for two of your term papers and then must turn this research into coherent 4000 word papers. It is also not a good idea to be so involved in writing said papers that you forget to eat for ten hours and end up with a massive headache.

In other news about my life: November continues to be my academic month of doom, and I think I might completely switch gears and apply for a History Masters because I have fallen completely in love with the study of Canadian history (never mind that I'm almost done a Political Science Honours degree, which meant I couldn't declare a minor. I'll cross my fingers that I have enough History credits to be considered). I'm still applying to around ten law schools in Canada and the US, though, as well as for a grad program in international affairs and a parliamentary internship in Ottawa. Yeah, my career goals for my career remain the same (serving abroad in the Foreign Service) but my well-laid plans for my near future have suddenly become less certain. I'm open to any and all suggestions (including options to run away and join the circus as the person with the most gigantic bags ever under her eyes from sleep deprivation).

*40 pages double-spaced. I'm not completely insane.

Articles like this: (title: "A Butler Well Served By This Election")
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/06/AR2008110603948.html?sub=new

Election Day - J.D. McClatchy (from today's New York Times)

The older couples had voted just after dawn,
And by noon the exit polls are underway.
Some talking head opines in San Jose.
My poster is mute and silent on the lawn.

“As the wind blows, so the flag will wave,”
Says a cynic who is nevertheless waiting in line.
The woman in front of him has been assigned
The nearest booth where she plans, again, to save

The Republic from itself — the drama played out
In this miniature theater, with its curtain and cast.
Today will be a performance of the past,
Its fortunes and flaws, its certainty and doubt.

The pencil has no eraser. She makes her choice,
Determined but still uncertain how it will end,
As the Founders were as well who thought to lend
So much importance to each small impassioned voice.

But will the cynic’s vote now cancel hers?
She stays behind to watch him enter the booth.
(In our democracy, we think “the truth”
Is what everyone, regardless, secretly prefers.)

She won’t know anything but threats and trends
Until, again in the dark, but midnight’s now,
She can sense what hope the numbers will allow,
And what you get when you smear or overspend.

She will sit and stare at charts on CNN.
(But aren’t we redeemed by what they cannot show?
The struggle in each restless heart to know
The terms on which the nation’s fate depends.)

She will think how, at last, millions have spoken as one,
That freedom requires an open mind and hand,
And the strength to be forgiven and understand,
And that tomorrow morning it has all just begun.

I'm reading this absolutely wonderful book of travel essays right now by Cees Nooteboom, Nomad's Hotel: Travels in Time and Space. Nooteboom is a Dutch novelist who appears to have an incredible life. He writes about travelling to the Gambia, to Aran (in Ireland), to Isfahan (even the name itself is alluring!), Mantua (Italy)...As one of the reviews says, "These journeys, this way of travelling - slow, meditative, solitary, full of knowledge - this is how we should all travel." And the way he writes! It's the sort of exceptional writing, full of insight and clarity, where the right word is chosen every time, that makes me feel like there is no point in trying to write because I cannot possibly write like this.

There are those people who need to travel - who need to see more, to know more - and I'm one of them. I'm not used to being here (home) at this time of year; since I started university, spring and summer have meant Europe and DC. Currently, I'm tethered to the ground by the fact that I'm writing the LSAT on Monday and I wanted to write it at home.

In case you have not had the pleasure of preparing for the LSAT, allow me to offer some words of wisdom: it sucks. It's the length of the test and the concentration it requires that's hardest for me. You can't really study for it because outside knowledge plays no part in the test, but you can prepare for it, which is what I've been trying to do for the last six weeks. I'm currently scoring 171 (out of 180) - I'd like to get a 173 on the actual test, so hopefully that's doable. That would give me a little more realistic of a chance that I'll get into any of the law schools I want to get into, most of which are in the U.S. (including Michigan, Arianna!)

I'm not entirely sure that I want to go to law school but I'm sure enough that I'm very nervous. Nervous that I won't do as well as I want to, scared that I'll somehow drop ten points, worried that I'm not exceptional enough to get into any of the law schools I want to get into. However, I am going to see Iron Man tonight which will hopefully help calm my nerves.

1. Forever in Blue: The Fourth Summer of the Sisterhood - Ann Brashares
2. Alanna: The First Adventure - Tamora Pierce
3. In the Hand of the Goddess - Tamora Pierce
4. The Woman Who Rides Like a Man - Tamora Pierce
5. The Rights Revolution - Michael Ignatieff (non-fiction)
6. Will & Me: How Shakespeare Took Over My Life - Dominic Dromgoole (memoir)
7. The Queen's Fool - Philippa Gregory
8. Away Laughing on a Fast Camel - Louise Rennison
9. Then He Ate My Boy Entrancers - Louise Rennison
10. Something Blue - Emily Giffin
11. Startled by His Furry Shorts - Louise Rennison
12. The Unfinished Canadian: The People We Are - Andrew Cohen (non-fiction)
13. Away From Her - Alice Munro
14. Blood and Belonging: Journeys into the New Nationalism - Michael Ignatieff (non-fiction)
15. What Remains - Carole Radziwill (memoir)
16. The Things They Carried - Tim O'Brien
17. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - J.K. Rowling
18. Love Is a Many Trousered Thing - Louise Rennison
19. Bloodletting & Miraculous Cures - Vincent Lam
20. The Far Enemy: Why Jihad Went Global - Fawaz A. Gerges (non-fiction; for school)
21. The Man Awakened From Dreams - Henrietta Harrison (non-fiction; for school)
22. Saving Fish From Drowning - Amy Tan
23. The Year of Magical Thinking - Joan Didion (memoir)

I don't know how big the bandwagon is, but I'm jumping on it regardless. Friday Night Lights has become my new favourite show - that's currently on air, anyway, nothing comes close to GG for me. I love it; I love so many of the characters and even the ones I don't especially like are interesting and make for good television. The drama is organic and believable, as opposed to the melodramatic soap that Grey's Anatomy has become. It's set in Dillon, Texas, a small town where football appears to be all they have in terms of town pride and the setting is also very well done, layered and full of realistic characters. It's also so funny. And, seriously, Tami and Coach Taylor are the best TV couple in the history of ever. And the acting! I cannot even describe to you how completely fantastic this show is but everyone should watch it. (Syf,[musamea], thank you so much for recommending it!!)

I'm very much enjoying this semester as well. I'm taking great, challenging courses: Russia in the 20th century, Modern China, American Politics, Middle East Politics, and Beginner's Russian. I used to think I could kind of pretend to be one of those people who's a natural at learning languages but my Russian class has cured me of this conceit. Cyrillic is hard - I haven't tried to learn a new alphabet in at least ten years when I attempted Punjabi - and my accent isn't as good as I'd like, but I love learning languages and I've always been fascinated by all things Russian so it's worth it. It's strange, in learning basic Russian grammar I'm learning things about English grammar that I didn't know before.

Campus is prettiest at this time of year: flecks of gold, falling leaves, and it's still warm enough to sit outside and read under the trees.

Bright Eyes is coming here in October and I'm pretty sure I want to go but I haven't heard the new CD. Has anyone heard it?

According to a Perez Hilton-reading friend, Milo is apparently dating Hayden Panettiere (Claire on Heroes). He is 30; she just turned 18 recently. I am older than her.

I've always been really bad at keeping a journal. A quick recap of the last few months:

I loved Washington. It's a beautiful city with great food, an endless stream of things to do and see and museums/monuments/memorials to visit, so many people who are working on important topics and really making a difference in tangible ways. It's also much greener and hotter than I expected (Syf (musamea, I have no idea how people live in the southeastern U.S. after May - I don't think I'd ever get used to the heat and humidity). I worked at The Protection Project, a human rights research institute at Johns Hopkins SAIS that focuses mainly on human trafficking. I learned a great deal about how utterly despicable human trafficking is, as well as more general research and administrative skills. I also took a course on twenty-first century U.S. foreign policy which was very interesting, especially since the perspective was different than it would have been at home. I got to interview experts at think tanks and institutes like USIP, CATO and Brookings for the policy paper I wrote for the class. Also as part of the program, we went for embassy visits, panels and lectures and I attended various discussions and screenings at places like CSIS and The Heritage Foundation. My RA works for the White House so we were invited to attend a celebration for the NCAA Division 1 and 2 champions on the South Lawn and I stood twenty feet away from President Bush. (By the way, security around the White House is insane.)One of the best things about living in Washington was that I was able to interveiw the First Political Secretary at the Canadian Embassy about a career in the Foreign Service, which is what I'm aiming for. Overall, it was a busy, illuminating experience and I met great people and had an excellent time.

I met my family in Orlando and we spent a week there, visiting the various parts of Disney World and shopping. I came home mid-August and since then I've been seeing friends, attending festivals, and watching movies. I'm going white-water rafting in Kananasksis for the next couple of days with seven friends, which should be a lot of fun. It's been a lovely summer but I'm still looking forward to going back to school this Wednesday.

Now, an important query. Since Gilmore Girls and Veronica Mars are over and Grey's Anatomy has become wretched, I only have The Office and Heroes left. What should become my other show? Entourage? Is it worth it to buy the first season of Friday Night Lights and catch up before the new season starts? Or should I stick to watching the Arrested Development dvds? (They're hilarious, by the way.)

I cried five times today. The first time was while watching a video about Gilmore Girls on youtube called "This One's for the Girls". The other four were while watching the series finale.

I had a Gilmore Girls party at my house, with all three friends (and my sister) who are devoted fans of the show. We ordered pizza and had cupcakes and tater tots and Pop Tarts and twizzlers and chocolate cake and popcorn...and basically ate enough to make Rory and Lorelai proud.

I've been rewatching various favourite scenes over the last week, to prepare myself. This show means an inordinate amount to me. I watched it from the very beginning, when I was in grade eight and immediately fell in love. I know a lot of people felt it declined over the past two seasons, and I suppose it did, to an extent, but I still loved those seasons. I loved every season. The best, and most important, part of the show for me was always the mother/daughter relationship, followed by the writing and wit.

The series finale was wonderful.
( Bon Voyage )

My dry-eyed friends were kind enough to not tease or mock and just handed me tissues during my hour-long cryfest. Oh, Gilmore Girls. being_fulfilled has an icon of Lorelai and Rory that says, "Sometimes I forget they're not real", which encompasses my feelings perfectly. I loved this show and these people: Lorelai and Rory, flawed human beings who made exceptionally bad decisions on occasion but were smart and funny and kind and caring and strong. I loved Gilmore's generous heart and warmth and the way it celebrated the small, everyday moments. I loved most of the secondary characters: Logan(!!!), Jess, Luke, Paris, Emily, Richard, Sookie, Michel, Babette, Gypsy, Reverend Skinner and the rabbi (my Dean-hate, however, remains deep and abiding). And I'm very grateful to have been privy to this world for seven seasons.(Also, it introduced me to fanfiction and it's the reason I have all my wonderful online friends.)

I'm watching it again tomorrow, as soon as I wake up. And again, I will cry and cry and cry. (Ha, I am so overemotional and overinvested!)

As someone said on TWoP, "That'll do, Gilmore Girls, that'll do."

My long, angry and spoiler-heavy reaction to last night's Gilmore Girls:
( WTF, Rosenthal?? )

Lalala. Life is fabbity fab fab. Exams are over and I am on SUMMER VACATION for four glorious months.

My last final was on Wednesday, and even though I had to play 'eenie meenie mini mo' and 'black shoe, white shoe, who's it, not you' on far too many questions (it was Psych, so it was multiple choice), I don't care, because I am done.

Since then I've caught up on all the tv I missed during the two weeks where I pulled out my hair and didn't sleep and lived on coffee, so I've now seen the last couple Gilmore Girls, Heroes and Grey's Anatomy.

Yesterday, Reena and I went to get massages (beyond awesome) and then I was originally supposed to go clubbing with other friends. Happily, they instead wanted to just hang out, so we had a sleepover and ate our weight in candy and chocolate.

I'm going to Calgary for the weekend in an hour to see my new baby cousin. It's so nice, not having to worry about school. *Stopping now, before you all hate me*

Also, my friend is starting a book club. I get to pick the first book, which I've decided will be The Things They Carried because I've heard so many good things about it, from people like Ari (literati555). Any suggestions for other good book club-type reading?

Since I'm about as single as single can be, I spent today giving out Valentine's cards and chocolate hearts to my friends (yes, like most people stopped doing in grade four...does this qualify as retro?), and generally spreading good cheer. (Not so much with the last part, but I did eat Lindt chocolate and thereby exponentially increase my own happiness.)

Tomorrow, Reena and I are going to see Music and Lyrics because we are suckers for Hugh Grant. He's very good at being charming, and romantic comedies are generally a harmless, fun way to spend a few hours.

And, the main reason for this post, a not-quite-as-well-known love poem for you all to (maybe?) enjoy:
( A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning )
-

I have this bad tendency: I get strangely possessive over things I love, such as books and tv shows, and when people I don't particularly like tell me they also like that character/show/line, I cringe. I sometimes have what feels like a very personal relationship with my books or whatever, so I end up being surprised that other people whom I don't like also enjoy them. Basically, I can be quite bitchy, but I was wondering if any of you ever felt like this?

It's Reading Week next week and my parents are going to St. Maarten (an island close to the Virgin Islands) for a week. I have a midterm and two papers due the week we get back, but I'm also planning to go paintballing and snowshoeing, attend some birthday parties, catch up on reading for fun, and relax.

Herewith, three of my most recent favourite sad songs (and the links):

If You Could Read My Mind - Gordon Lightfoot
http://www.yousendit.com/transfer.php?action=batch_download&batch_id=mYB+eiIeBId5TA==

When you reach the part where the heartaches come
The hero would be me
But heroes often fail
And you won't read that book again
Because the ending's just too hard to take


Heartbeats - Jose Gonzalez
http://www.yousendit.com/transfer.php?action=batch_download&batch_id=mYDfmaPCp3l5TA==

To call for hands of above
To lean on
Wouldn't be good enough
For me, no

Set the Fire to the Third Bar - Snow Patrol feat. Martha Wainwright (this song makes me want to write Veronica/Duncan)
http://www.yousendit.com/transfer.php?action=batch_download&batch_id=mYBgo3NaBId5TA==

I find the map and draw a straight line
Over rivers, farms, and state lines
The distance from here to where you'd be
It's only finger-lengths that I see
I touch the place where I'd find your face
My finger in creases of distant dark places

Let me know if the links don't work, or if I need to upload them again.

Happy New Year, all! I have yet to make any written-down resolutions, but they usually don't vary from year to year, so it's not a big deal. I spent my New Year's Eve at my friend's boyfriend's house party. It was fun, but also not that fun. Perhaps this had something to do with the fact that apart from the people driving, I was the only other person not drinking.

I met Justin Trudeau in Montreal. He's the son of a former Prime Minister and is ridiculously good looking - better looking than Milo, I swear - and the most charismatic person I have ever met. Seriously, so charming.

I think this is my problem. I only like people (by which I mean boys) I can't have. There are hot guys in my Poli Sci classes, but as soon as I actually start to get to know them, I no longer have any interest in them other than possibly friendship. They're nice, smart, and even funny, sometimes, and yet. I am obviously very fickle.

I go back to school on Monday. It's been a good break - I got to see friends, watch movies (Happy Feet, Blood Diamond, and I'm going to see The Good Shepherd in an hour), relax, read - and I'm excited about the two new classes I'll be taking: Psych 105 and a History course about nineteenth and twentieth century Europe (I'm in three full-year Poli Sci classes, so those won't change). I'm applying to The Washington Center (in Washington, D.C.) for a ten-week internship during the summer term. It sounds really awesome: working for four to four and a half days per week, plus attending Presidential lectures, visiting embassies, etc. Since it's in Washington, if I get it, I could be working for organizations like Amnesty International, or for Congresspeople and Senators, or various embassies. It's a competitive thing, so I'm not sure how good my chances are, but I'd really love to get it. I'm currently attempting to write an essay for the application that doesn't suck and sound both really bad and really pretentious. So far, I am not succeeding in this attempt.

Ari (literati555), I got your package! Thank you sooo much!!!