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CHRISTINA HERALD'S JOURNAL
KEEP OUT
JONNY, THIS MEANS YOU!!!
(You really didn't want to know this kind of stuff anyway, bro. Trust me.)
17 April
Thursday Night
Ick, I can still taste the damn bubble soap. Hopefully the stuff won't poison the Doc...
I can't believe that Malcolm just showed up the way he did. He is beginning to act entirely too much the jealous boyfriend for someone who doesn't want to label our relationship, whatever that bullshit means. What was it Caesar said of Cassius? Or was it Brutus? Doesn't matter...quoth he, "He thinks too much, such men are dangerous." That pretty much sums up Mal. Doctor Bee (Buzz...?) said that if I needed physical protection from Mal, I was on my own. I just rolled my eyes at him, but it sounded a little too prophetic for my tastes. Is psychic power a prerequisite for being a shrink? Who knows? I don't want to. True, Mal has been nothing but gentle, especially in our, ahem, physical dealings, but who wants to tempt the fates? Who, indeed...
18 April
Friday Afternoon
Okay, now it is official. All of my friends are creeped out by Malcolm. Bessa just rounded out the equation. This should tell me something, but in a strange sort of way I find the idea of one last wild ride compelling in an adolescent sort of way. I seriously doubt this is healthy. Even my cat hates him, and Lance loves everyone. Weird. Ring-ring!! It's the clue phone, for me...?
Carmichael is home safe and sound!! YEAH! I actually miss the auld goat, and I never ever thought I'd say that. It's weird how one event can change things around so completely. If he hadn't had his heart attack I doubt I would have realized just how much he taught me. Or how terrible it would have been to lose such a mentor. Well, I still would have had Bessa but it's not quite the same thing. Bessa is nurturing my career and intellect in a different way than Carmichael does. She's more gentle, almost Zen about the whole thing. Carmichael is in my face, challenging me to prove what I know, almost daring me to tell him he's wrong. He keeps me learning, just to one up him. What all this boils down to is that he invited me and Bessa over for tea tomorrow to celebrate his return home.
19 April
Saturday
Oh no. The unthinkable is happening. Aunt Sarah called this morning, and Grandma Strauss is coming into town early. Monday, to be exact. I have to pick her up from the airport and she's staying at my place until Sarah and Gavin come up in another week or two. AGH! No, I love Grandma. I do. I just have to keep telling myself that. More importantly, she loves me a lot, and I have to keep that in mind when she hides things in my apartment in the name of tidying up and cooks strange German things on my stove, both of which I know will happen.
Carmichael has the coolest old Victorian house in the world! Some dusting and polishing and the place could be a historian's dream come true. He made us a full British high tea, the old showoff, and we all had a really good time. Then he threatened me with death if he got back to the classroom and all his Comp students had gone soft, due to my spoiling them. I was pleased to inform him that they were almost as scared of me as they were of him, and he looked proud of me. It was all good.
20 April
Sunday
It's Sunday. I'm sleeping. For hours and hours.
21 April
Monday Night
Retrieved Grandma from the airport today. She prayed the whole way home because I tend to drive like I'm on a racetrack in rush hour traffic, as it's the only way to stay alive. She adored Lancelot, and vice-versa. She bought him fresh chicken livers, and he is now convinced that I have been purposefully starving him for the last month and a half, as dry cat food is completely inferior. Spoiled little shit. She immediately set to cooking, but luckily for me she made strudel rather than something like liver dumpling soup. I admit, when she first pulled out the chicken livers for the kit-cat, I was worried. Thank gods my fears proved unfounded. Oh yeah, she cleaned. Immediately. And I went into an attack, yes one of THOSE attacks, because I had papers strewn hither and yon across my apartment for my research projects and she moved them somewhere. I know not where. She insists that she didn't throw them away, though. We'll see. Maybe I just shouldn't leave her alone in the apartment. Hurricane Grandma causing irreparable damage. Deep breath. She loves me, I love her. There. I feel better. I still can't find the papers, though. Or the schnapps. Or my car keys...
21 April
Tuesday
I left Gram at home for a couple of hours with a videotaped performance of "Cabaret" to go have a beer with Bessa and Robyn at this bar Robyn likes. There was, of course, no Double Bock. A pox upon the sadistic mastermind behind seasonal beers. The bartender was very sweet, though. He just nodded and smiled a lot as I rambled. His job, I guess.
So I get home and as I'm walking up the stairs, Malcolm appears and pulls me into his apartment. He tells me this insane story about my grandmother and a meat cleaver. Or at least I thought it was insane till I got inside my own apartment. I found Grandma sitting on the futon with a blanket thrown over her head. The cat was in one hand, and a meat cleaver was in the other. In a rush of words that came out half in English and half in German I got the story that a burglar had come in without knocking and frightened her, but left when she brandished the cleaver at him. My grandmother, who will not even squish a spider, chased my boyfriend (sort of) out of my apartment with a meat cleaver. I'm living in the twilight zone. This is my twilight zone.
23 April
Wednesday
I finally told Mal that I'll go with him to this concert thingy Friday night. We're picking Jonny up, too. It should be interesting at least. I don't know why Mal looks so disgusted when he talks about going. It's like he doesn't really want to. I don't know why. They are supposed to be friends of his, the band I mean. I guess, like it or not, I'm gonna find out.
Grandma has settled in and is actually very easy to live with. She is a bit compulsive about a few things, though. She talks to my plants, the cat, the TV, everything in the apartment it seems. It's not like she doesn't talk to me too, though. I don't understand. But she's teaching me how to play bridge and we've taken to having a glass of schnapps together in the evenings. She's a cool, cool lady. But I still can't find my papers.
Doc is going to be disappointed in me. I fell off the wagon, so to speak, and did an all night cram session with a little help from my friend, the espresso bean. Wigged out, of course. When am I not wigging out lately? I threw a temper tantrum and had a panic attack because I couldn't find my car in a parking lot this morning. Tis the season to be edgy, fa la la la la...I will be so glad when this is over. I am glad I took the five year program, because it's nice to know that I'm halfway through grad school already even as I'm finishing my BSEd. However, working a real job and being a grad student promises to be amusing. Well, I guess we'll see how it goes....
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Doctor Balis' Notes on this Journal
Christina Herald's Journal
