Holiday

Yesterday, in an absurd coda to an otherwise lovely holiday weekend, I spent eight hours in the car trying to get from CT to Philadelphia, a trip that should normally take about three and a half to four hours. I spent four of those eight hours waiting to cross the Tappan Zee bridge. It took me four hours to get twelve miles. Unbelievable. Then my housemate calls, and I find out that she's two lanes over from me in the same gridlock. She said it was the worst traffic she'd ever seen, not counting her first Thanksgiving when it took her eight hours to get home. This was at 4pm, when I still had some hope of making it home before 7 or so. Ha, no. Eight hours it was. She got home an hour after me because she got off the road after the bridge to eat something, but I just couldn't bring myself to stop the car once I finally, FINALLY could go above one mile per hour.

Besides that, I had a great holiday! We went out for pizza with Sean's friends Wednesday night (Pepe's, naturally) and I met Santore's girlfriend, who was visiting with him from Florida. Thursday we went up to my aunt's for dinner and they wanted to know all about the wedding, so I showed them the inn, and the bridesmaid dresses, and my dress, etc. etc. Friday evening was our high school reunion, which was not particularly well-attended. They threw us in with the 10 year anniversary class, and the food (for which we paid $35) was Mexican food prepared by the cafeteria staff. I kid you not, make your own tacos! They even charged for water or soda, in addition to the crappy wine and margaritas. Nice, Northwest, very nice. Meanwhile, Sean's reunion gets catered by Lucibello's.

Anyway, the reunion was fine. No one had really changed much, appearance or otherwise. Oh, except Dan Luddy, who had six months' worth of beard after hiking the entire Appalachian trail! After a couple hours (and the strange feeling of wandering the halls of high school with a wineglass) people filtered out; most went to Black Bear, but a bunch of us went to the Cheesecake Factory instead, which turned out to be more fun than the reunion proper, I thought. Beside the four of us, it was Pace, Annie, Chris Swetckey, Andrew Stanton, and Tim O'Rourke, who I don't think I ever actually had a conversation with during high school. When we said good night it was weird to think that at least a couple of them I probably won't see for another five years, if I go to the ten year reunion at all (I really, really don't want to pay $35 for crappy Tex-Mex again, kthanxbai). Sean and I realized that at the ten year reunion, we will still be in graduate school, so it's not even like there would be anything to update anyone on!

Saturday Sara and I saw Twilight. Best/worst movie ever. It amused me highly and the Edward actor is delicious to look at, but these kids have got to be some of the most untalented actors I have ever seen. It was pretty ridiculous, especially considering that I heard they've been offered $15 million each for a sequel. You could find kids in a middle-school play evincing more complex emotions than the girl who played Bella. Also, this movie's message to tweens about relationships is seriously flawed, as I think just about every review has emphasized. Their attraction can be summed up as follows: She smells good plus he looks good equals a whole bunch of NEVER LEAVE ME EVER I AM NOTHING WITHOUT YOU IN MY LIIIIIIIIIIIIIFE. Jesus. And yet--will I see the second movie? Um, probably. He's really pretty. Sometimes, it's all you need.