Today, I trekked down to the nation’s luuurvely capital for a one-day shadowing internship at an environmental advocacy group.

…this was interesting.

4:00 AM

Roll out of bed to sound of roommate’s alarm, which I have set across the room. Being desensitized to my own alarm clock, I wake up to hers. Am bleary-eyed.

4:18 AM

Give up trying to convince insomniac friend on AIM to go to sleep. Chat with best friend, who’s also just woken up (except that this is normal for her).

4:40 AM

Finally get ready and get dressed and get packed. Tear my left thumbnail half off the root accidentally when pulling on a boot. Cut off thumbnail and leave most in the root. Pain. Slog out of the room.

5:15 AM

Make it to the train station. Find internship partner; upon getting to know one another, we find that we both turn out to be environmental idealists with friends who are theater kids or gamers (hers, a DnD group; mine, console and PC gamers) and we both make strange noises. Life is remarkable.

6:18 to some time between 8 and 9

Take train, study paper, fall asleep, rinse, repeat, get off train, stumble around Union Station, catch the metro, stumble around Washington D.C., eventually find place where we need to be.

by 10 AM

Get situated, study news briefs, talk about the environment, get introduced to everyone, find more stuff in common, flip out, try to stay awake, eat bagel.

10 AM

Continue eating bagel, sit in on nationwide conference call between various offices of group, try to decipher jargon, try not to doze off too obviously, speak very convincingly.

11:15 AM

Are introduced to various staff members, talk about jobs, discuss career paths, get the name of a very useful job search site. Success!

12:30 PM

Discuss environmental study, speak more convincingly, try not to fall asleep some more. Get wistful. Grin goofily at e-mail. Try not to fall asleep.

1 PM

Partner, host, and I go out for lunch. Salad is absolutely fantastic and paid for by host. Talk about careers and college. Laugh a lot.

2 PM

Meet more awesome people on staff in other divisions. Meet man with striking blue eyes who is an environmental engineer in law school. Regain hope for the world and admiration for dark blue eyes.

3 PM

Return to discussing environmental paper until host realizes just how asleep the two of us are and gives us a break until 4.

4 PM

Go over a news alert to be put out and attempt to title it. Come up with ridiculous titles like “Under the Influence” and “She Blinded Me With Science”. Laugh tons.

5 PM

Leave. Experience was amazing, work was not hard, everyone working there was very intelligent and seemed to love what they did, and now partner and I kinda really want to work in non-profit/public sector. Even if it doesn’t pay that much. REALLY want to work in public sector. Know that mother would probably flip infinite amounts of shit if I did.

5:20 PM

Stop by the world’s most fascinating little upscale sushi restaurant. Apparently the Washington Post very much approves. A cucumber avocado roll is a hefty $3 but it’s packaged so interestingly and one day I will return to eat there with plenty of money in hand. Catch metro to train station.

5:40 PM

Bored to death in Union Station. Start taking pictures of the pretty sushi bag and finally get a good shot of the green swirl on the side. Set it as phone background.

5:55 PM

Still bored to death. Have been texting best friend in California. She is disgruntled and restarting classes at community col. Hope she doesn’t do anything stupid. Like me. At least I haven’t gotten put on academic probation. Yet. Do not want to check final grades.

6:10 PM

Train leaves.

6:52 PM

Type all of the above on train. Still bored. Still tired. Want to call people. Can’t. Free minutes start at 9. Bleh.

7:57 PM

Reached the other city. Still back to school. Realize that this train goes all the way up to NYC. Kinda wish I could take this train all the way up to NYC. Can’t.

8:42 PM

Waiting.

8:50 PM

Connection train doesn’t run in the evenings over break, apparently. Wait for shuttle bus.

9:15 PM

Shuttle bus comes. Can’t really feel my toes by this point; it’s 20-something degrees. Dashing squash player sitting next to me on the bus alleviates my boredom. Amusing guy, a junior, reminds me of someone I knew in high school.

9:40 PM

Finally back in room. Still can’t really feel toes, but now I can eat sushi! And this is the best-tasting roll I’ve really ever had, even just for cucumber and avocado. $3 were worth it.

While there was a time during which I secretly took stock in zodiac definitions– and it made sense, too; mutable air, metal horse, the hierophant, the priestess, not-so-feminine– right now I am in adamant, adamant denial of them.

Going by zodiacs, everything I thought my instinct could discern is declared untrue. One that makes sense and does not clash– incompatible, polar opposite, avoid at all costs, “can potentially break your spirit”, all sorts of not-good. One that makes me uncomfortable, does not feel right– ideal, same month, go-for-it by Western calendars…”incompatible” from the East?

I shall toss the zodiacs out the window. I am an air element, a running free spirit, a lover of metal and wind and water because I am. I choose because I do. And I dream because I can. It is not the year or month I was born; it is my very definition that cannot be predicted. Fuck you, astrology. We define ourselves, and it is through sheer, sheer coincidence that most marriages that last are zodiac-defined.

Actually, now that I think of it, compatible ones don’t always last either, and sometimes ones that aren’t do, so HA. Fuckers.

…I swear I’m not loopy.