i think i'll call it morning from now on

I rediscovered Gil Scott-Heron this morning when I woke up singing that song. It was a good rediscovery. I am enjoying my small collection of his stuff (15 songs from different albums and years and so on), and wishing I had more. Maybe I'll go look for some more today. I don't have class, so I got to wake up nice and late and lay in bed for a while. Now I'm going to make lunch and work on a couple of little essays I have to do for tomorrow. I have the pronunciation class from 4:30-5:30, but as I've said before, that doesn't really count, plus it gives me an excuse to go back into COPA and bring Isa and Katie the flowers they deserve. I searched desperately for a florist yesterday in the COPA neighborhood, but neither of the supermarkets I found sold them (LAME) and the only one I ended up coming across was like for weddings and stuff and had huge gorgeous bouquets for way more than I was willing to spend. So I didn't get to do that yesterday and was quite stressed about it. But today, I'm going to find flowers on the way there if it kills me.

Last night, I had my first real relationship fight. Judy and I didn't really fight and every fight Jenna and I had doesn't count because, well, just because. It was confusing and new and upsetting and made me angry and sad and I didn't really know what to do. But I got home around 10:15, Olga, out of nowhere, IMed me that she was sending me love, I thanked her, put on shorts and my running shoes and went out to run. I ran very hard for about 40 minutes and by the time I got back I was wide awake, sore as hell, sweaty and felt better. I was still confused and upset about what had happened, but much calmed down about it. Then Olga told me that two people very close to her had been crushed by a tree; one of them was killed and the other is recovering from a spinal injury in Ann Arbor. Nothing like a little perspective to put your troubles out of mind. I miss Olga.

Anyhow, in other news, I've finally selected a team to support. I am disappointed in myself, but I've settled on la Universidad de Chile (no connection to the university in which I study), aka la U. They're the second-most boring pick I could have made, after Colo-Colo, which is the most popular and most historically successful Chilean football (soccer) team. I wanted to pull for Santiago Wanderers, because I like that name a lot and they have classy jerseys and aren't terrible, but they play out of Valparaiso and I need to root for a team whose home games I can go to with ease. La U fits the profile. So anyhow, time to start learning the roster and the cheers and going to games. The "Clásica" between la U and la Católica (Cata) was on Sunday, while I was playing frisbee, and la U won. My host family supports Cata, but they're the wine-and-cheese, rich people team and I want no part of that Dean Dome nonsense. Plus neither Luz María nor my host brothers cares particularly about soccer. So there you have it. La U.

Now I'm going to go make lunch. One quick note: Sunday was also the first time I'd got to wear my Crocs outside here because wearing shoes with socks when you're about to put on cleats is just dumb if you can at all avoid it. They are such great shoes, no matter how ugly certain persons might say they are. Thanks, Mom!