Things keep happening and I keep not writing about them. Of course, some of this was because I was some thousand miles or so away from my computer, but the last week it’s basically been inertia. Anyway, I’ll get back to that.

Tuesday and Thursday I was knocked out, drugged, and left bleeding in a dark alley. Okay, so only the middle one, which was as close to gainful employment as I’ve been all summer. And getting up at 6:15 didn’t even suck as much as I thought it would. But that might be because there was a stimulant involved.

Right, so upon my arrival at the U of C hospitals, I signed some things, ate a granola bar, and produced a urine sample. Fun. Anyway, I then had to swallow two rather large green capsules of a) stimulant, b)sedative, or c) placebo. I felt kinda peppy, so it could have been stimulant. The main part of the procedure was actually comprised of sitting around reading magazines and waiting for the drug to kick in. And then, after a brief survey to determine my mood and whether or not I was getting the shakes, the real fun began. I was shown series of images at varying speeds (all the way up to about 8/second or so), and then I’d get another set of images, and I’d have to say if they were in the first set and how sure I was. All of this was done on what looked like a fairly early model iMac. The images ranged from close-ups of flowers or bugs, to landscapes, to angry snakes, to people, to people with massive burns or facial tumors, to people having sex, to a wad of cash, and that one that was just a hand with a gun pointed at the camera. Lots of variety, apparently designed to provoke a variety of emotional responses. Fun.

Oh, and I later learned that I was, in fact, dosed with D-amphetamine on whichever day it was (double-blind study). Apparently it was supposed to increase my emotional responsiveness, and thereby allow them to determine some facet of how human memory works.

I felt peppier on Tuesday, but then Thursday I was rash and impulsive, so it’s hard to day which one. Thursday, for example, I climbed the tree in our backyard for the first time in at least several years. This was tricky, because it mostly grows up except for the little branches that just get in the way. But with some creative maneuvering I made it high enough to step onto our garage, which I promptly jumped off of without even seriously injuring myself.

Also, despite the fact that it is an impractically long commute, I love taking the CTA to and from U of C. Chicago is an awesome city, not only because we actually have practical public transportation. There’s just so much cool stuff to see. And for some reason, I just really dig the way old neighborhood get, with all the architectural variations and dense tree cover. And I really love the trees that have clearly gotten bigger than anyone planned for them to be, seizing fences and pushing up sidewalks. It’s just cool. Although it is possible I was drugged when I came to this conclusion, so.

You know, I always find it rather alarming when I blog over a page in Word, even though technically there will be no pages in the final format. I can be a little wordy and ramble-y at times, but I’m sure that hasn’t come to anyone’s attention yet. But the point is, I haven’t even gotten to all the main content of my post, that being my trip to Texas to visit Megan, which was awesome.

Houston is a strange and foreign land, and the natives have a wide variety of indecipherable customs, such as left-turn signals with two red lights. And they fry alligator, which is actually pretty tasty. Yes, I tried several new foods, most of which I liked. Shut up already.

As I was saying, Houston is a land of sweltering heat, primordial humidity, and vast tracts of land – Vast enough to have $3 dollar parking in the strikingly small downtown area, suburb-esque subdivisions well inside the city, and one particularly ugly suburb of prefab mansions (when you have the same grand, colonnaded, chandelier-strewn entryway as the guy next door, it dampens the effect).

But where was I? Oh, right, awesomeness. Despite the above and aside from the total lack of public transit, Houston is actually a pretty decent city. But that’s really beside the point, as I had spent all of five minutes there when Megan snuck up behind me at the airport. And much happiness ensued.

Such as the baseball game we went to on Wednesday, back when the Cubs were still kinda in the wildcard chase. And they beat Houston, woot! Also, Carlos Zambrano hit a home run that went right under us in right field. It was awesome. And Minute Maid is a good park, even with that crazy-ass hill in center field – and the train. Seriously, a train.

Er, anyway, there was also a sojourn into one of Houston’s parks, with much frisbeeing and resultant attempts to breathe water (did I mention it was humid), and occasionally people were tackled for no good reason. Also, there were sadly no alligators in the creek, merely turtles. But supposedly there are alligators. And we climbed a tree, which was also fun. Now I’m going to digress for a moment and claim that tree-climbing is the hip new thing to do, because I am a trend-setter, and I’ve already climbed two this month. Right.

Also, we went clubbing. Yes, I went to a club – a primarily Hispanic club, no less. odds, anyone? But Megan’s friend Ana recommended it, and thus with two Venezuelans and one Spanish-fluent Texan, I was doomed. It was actually a lot of fun. Though henceforth when I travel, I shall take nice clothes, no matter how implausible it is that I shall need them, so that I need not borrow school shoes from recent acquaintances. Anyway, there was much dancing and colliding with random passers-by, and a live band that was actually pretty good, despite my not being able to comprehend any of the lyrics. Also , Megan was dressed up, which was interesting, as this is something that happens only a few times every millennium, and so that gave me ample opportunity to both make fun of her and compliment her profusely.

And there was a museum of natural science, which happened to have a huge exhibit on the Lord of the Rings movies, which allowed the two of us to geek out in appropriately extensive fashion. Teehee. Also, there were rocks, in a very impressively varied mineral and gemstone exhibit… and a giant squid… and a hand-on demonstration of fluid dynamics that I had way too much fun with.

And, let’s see, Houston has this really cool freestanding waterfall dealy, which is all lit-up and night and flagrantly romantic. And there were movies, and DVDs, and lounging about, and playing with dogs, and meeting of various friends, and trying of new foods, and I’m probably forgetting something still, but whatever it was, that was great too. Really, the only trouble was that I eventually had to leave. Marvelous trip, spectacular girl.

Alright, this has gone on just long enough. I’ve got to stop putting these things off.