I try to walk away and I stumble...

The other day, I slipped on the sidewalk. I was the person you see fall from a distance and your eyes get real wide for a second and you audibly gasp because you are like, "holy crap that person just fell. so. hard." And if you are in a close enough radius to the person who fell, you are socially required to jog a couple of steps towards them because you probably should at least look like you have the intent of trying to help them and/or pick up all of their strewn belongings. 

I REALLY fell. My body was upright at one second and entirely on the sidewalk in another. And I know that the blame for this extravagant fall lies with a pair of sandals that I love to wear that are just exceptionally smooth on the bottom. It's like the Steve Madden employee packing my order gave them a light spray of WD-40 before they sent them on their way to my doorstep. The sandals and I have had some close calls together, but they are so good looking that I keep wearing them. I've just learned to take corners nice and slow because there's a good chance my feet could slide right out from under me while wearing them. Like the time I slipped on the tiled floor of my office bathroom. Or when I rounded the corner to my bedroom too quickly and slid into the door jam with my head. I consider them a dastardly friend. Like the one that has a sense of sarcasm so dry and cutting that when it's directed at you it kind of hurts your feelings but the rest of the time they are so hilarious you overlook it? I've been overlooking the fact that these shoes might be a safety hazard. Because they are REALLY the perfect looking shoe. It's hard to be a slave to fashion. (That's my dry and cutting sarcasm).

So let me tell you about the fall. The circumstances preceding the fall were none too rare: the bus I was riding home from work was stalled for one mysterious MUNI reason or another. I would rather walk a mile than have to fidget around on public transit craning my neck to see what's causing the hold up (there is never anything to see) and continually refreshing my Instagram feed (where there is also never anything to see) while waiting for an undetermined amount of time. So I got off the god forsaken bus in a huff because that's what you do when you are a jaded San Franciscan whose MUNI bus has just stopped in the middle of the road for no readily apparent reason. You huff and you shake your figurative fist and make some sort of snide comment about how the entire mass transit system here "is so messed up" and you just fucking walk. 

I was huffing away from the bus and about to step right into the crosswalk when I biffed it. I think the combination of my quick clip and the every so slight downhill decline of the sidewalk did me in. I should have known! I'm no Steve Madden WD-40 sandals rookie! But I did fall. My right foot went skittering forward and I went down very ungracefully on my left side. I'm sure it was exceedingly clear to all passersby that I had never taken one of those martial arts classes where they teach you how to fall "properly" (which is probably to prepare you for a physical altercation but might be handy for taking a tumble on the sidewalk). The large bruise on my thigh is proof. And while I remember very few things about the moments before the fall (because I was not expecting to be recounting my walk home from the bus in excruciating detail and thus was not taking notes for my keen journalistic monologue), I do remember all of the very lame things that happened afterward.

1. I fell into the gutter. The gutter is gross! It's full of dried leaves and gum and what I imagine to be matted rat fur and it's all caked together into a mash of yuck probably because its been peed upon 8 trillion times (which is the only logical conclusion because everything in SF smells vaguely of urine). So I took a nice dip into that. 

2. Strangers came to help me. Three suited, middle-aged men who all had their ties tucked into their shirts (because that is something men do when it's windy out? I'm not positive about this but I do think it's silly looking so I definitely remembered it) came jogging from the crosswalk to make a series of polite remarks like "Are you okay?" and "Wow, really took a tumble there, huh?" I blacked out my responses to these questions because so much blood was rushing to my blushing face that none was actually circulating to my brain. I could have said a lot of things, I could have said nothing, I truly don't remember. Make up whatever you want here.  

3. A strange array of items propelled themselves from the various impractical pockets of my backpack because of the force of my fall. The three helpful strangers picked them up for me while I sat on the curb collecting myself and hoping my ability to speak would soon return. The objects were as follows: three separate USB drives, one of which was shaped like a tiny rubber dog bone. A padlock. An ergonomically-shaped pink and purple wireless computer mouse with a pattern of carefree butterflies swirling around some flowers. The objects I am glad did not come springing off of my person into the dirty gutter for everyone to see: the 8 rotting bananas or the Old Spice men's deodorant I also was carrying in my backpack.

The whole thing was kind of like one of those "what's in your bag?" features they do of celebrities in People magazine or that bloggers post on Instagram. Except those are always by choice and are usually supposed to give you some sort of insight into a person. Like how much they loves their Burt's Bees chapstick or how they never leave home without their Moleskine notebook and the fancy fountain pen that their grandfather gave them for college graduation because you never know when inspiration may strike blah blah blah. My "what's in your bag?" moment was more ambush style because I was not really planning on having all of my belongs put on display in the gutter and obviously would have curated a much more intriguing and Instagram-able array of ephemera had I known I would be dumping them all out. 

So I've thought about how these things would look to a stranger and how if I had been one of the suited men helping me collect my belongings I definitely would have thought I was a sweaty (Old Spice) computer hacker (why else would I have so many presumably data-filled USBs?) with carpal tunnel (hello, ergonomic mouse) who was off to do some nefarious work (walking very fast, has a padlock to lock up secrets) and has a strange penchant for only eating near-rotten bananas (because everyone knows computer hackers are quirky). It's the most obvious explanation, really.

However, I doubt any of the helpful suited strangers even let their imaginations get this far away from them because they didn't have to spend the next 17 minutes sweating and tiptoeing their way home in treacherous sandals. In fact, I know they didn't because you definitely don't wear suits and sandals if you're classy enough to tuck your tie into your shirt when there's a breeze.

4. The lamest thing of all? The bus that I disembarked from in a huff, and soon thereafter fell to the ground, passed me down the road approximately 10 minutes later. I shook my literal fist this time.

Me Being Helpful

The other night, my company co-hosted an event with Airbnb at their ultra-hip-we're-too-cool-for-school offices. I volunteered to attend the event not because I love talking about student loan refinancing or mortgages (don't tell anyone), but because I love to spy on design-y offices and it felt like there was a 50/50 chance my ultra-hip future husband might also be in attendance. And free food. That, too. 

I started getting nervous on the day of said event when I learned that by agreeing to "attend" I would actually have to "man a table and talk about our different product offerings to attendees." So I was not in fact an attendee anymore. I was the attendee educator. Do you know how hard it is for me to even explain what my company does to my friends? When I'm talking to people with whom I can use the word "like" an indecent amount of times and squint my eyes and tilt my head at and say "ya know?" at the end of my explanation? It's very hard. Mainly because I didn't know what refinancing meant until I got hired as their graphic designer and since I don't need a mortgage why would I know what PMI means and what LIBOR rates are? (Do you see how I'm using these acronyms to bamboozle you? I bet it's working).

So anyways I went from casual attendee to casual fake-helpful employee very quickly. Unfortunately when I arrived at the event, I was further upgraded to sweaty, panicking employee. I was charged with taking a sign and its easel-type stand and placing it outside the auditorium where the discussion panel was going to be held. I recognize that on the surface seems very simple. It was, in fact, the opposite (hence the panicking and the sweating and why I'm even telling this story).

I think it's also important to know that while this is happening, I was going through my internal flash cards of appropriate responses to possible attendee questions (i.e. Q: "What is PMI?" A: "I'm not quite sure". Q: "How does refinancing work?" A: "I don't know". Q: "Can you help me?" A: "Uhhhhh..."), plus I was also freaking out about running into someone I had interviewed with in the past. Because one time I interviewed at Airbnb. And during that process I met what felt like 12 different people over multiple hours of talking and interviewing and wooing. Which was obviously not successful because had I gotten the job, I would be married to my ultra-hip Airbnb husband by now and would not be charged with answering questions about financial products.

So I've been entrusted with with this sign and this easel-tripod hybrid stand that comes in a handy box with three-step instructions on the outside that all include the word "easy", "basic", or "simple" and boast very professional results. My designated Airbnb handler escorts me into the elevator and we take a very silent ride to the 5th floor where we are supposed to drop off the signage. Except when we get there I realize he has taken me to the cafeteria and I say "I think the panel is happening in the auditorium" so then we take a very silent walk down to the fourth floor. All the while, I've been surreptitiously trying to read the box instructions and side-eye every person we pass in case A) they look like my future husband or B) I have met them and need to make a very quick decision whether to acknowledge or ignore them.

When we get to the auditorium I am already sweating because I've been walking all over this palatial office and my brain is REALLY hot from trying to remember things about loans and refinancing AKA MY JOB. And then I pull the easel out of the box and realize that the person who wrote the instructions was actually having an elaborate joke because nothing about this set-up was "easy", "basic", or "simple". I could have put up an 8-person tent quicker. It was just a strange conglomeration of parts that seemingly had nothing to do with each other or the images on the box. And while I'm trying to forcibly jam these strange metal legs together, all I can think about is how I would like my 4 years of college tuition back because shouldn't I know how to do this? An additional disclosure I would like to make is that as many as 20 Airbnb employees in the near vicinity watched me in my employer-branded shirt grappling with the easel. And sweating. And probably breathing heavily, if I'm being honest. So it's good my company brought me along as the face of the brand.  

At this point, I have spent so much time not putting together the easel that I call my coworker because I'm wigging. I discover that she is also unable to put together the easel that she was tasked with. Unfortunately we cannot help each other because she is 3 lightyears away in another galaxy of this labyrinthine office which is why we needed so many goddamn signs in the first place. I have no idea where my handler is. But I also do not want him to come back and find out that I cannot put together a basic SIGN TRIPOD. I can't leave the area that I'm in because I don't have a badge. I also cannot leave my sign outside the auditorium doors in its current state because I have it propped on a trash can and the easel is laying askew on the floor in front of it. So it looks like trash. Which is a great way to welcome people to a professional event. 

At minute 14 of my playing-it-cool sign assembly (NOT), I make a very crucial discovery that allows me to snap the easel right together. Not only does it stand upright by itself, it also holds the sign. I feel equipped to be an engineer at this point. Or train to be an astronaut. I've never felt more accomplished or relieved. I want to look around at the Airbnb employees who have been privy to my struggle, but then I realize that really no one cares. Because the extreme drama of this event is mainly happening in my head. In my mind, I'm a perspiring beast who is warping metal rods with my bare hands and grunting from the effort. To everyone else, I'm a girl in a corner kind of fiddling with some foam core and aluminum legs. Weirder things have happened. 

At this time, my handler miraculously reappears to inform me that the event is not actually happening in the auditorium. And then I laugh in that strange, cuckoo way that's too loud and changes pitch lets people know you might go postal, but you're still interested in maintaining some semblance of normalcy. My handler escorts me back to the cafeteria, with the easel signage in tow, because I was wrong and the sign does actually belong there. I drop it no fewer than three times on our silent walk back upstairs to the relative safety of the table I'm supposed to man, where the sign is supposed to be placed, and where ALL my other coworkers are. Has no one heard of the buddy system? Why was I sent on sign duty ALONE?!

At the table, I greet the actual attendees and smile so. much. in the hopes that they will be dazzled into asking me zero questions. And then I eat my fancy free startup dinner and have a fancy rosebud and tamarind fizzy bev. And let me tell you, rosebud and tamarind fizzy bev tastes like 8x better when you're a sweaty wretch who just assembled an easel. 

A Year(ish)

Sometimes I think about how I've lived in SF for over a year and it feels like nothing has changed. Which is kind of depressing because, in theory, a year is a lot of time for things to happen. But then I found my old sketchbook from when I had just started interning last June and realized plenty of things have (thankfully) changed. The following are some 100% real notes and thoughts that I deemed important enough to commit to paper and remember forever from that time. Please let us all enjoy this glimpse into the psyche of 22-year-old Delaney. And then we can all vote on how much we think I've changed. 

NOTE TO SELF NO. 1:

For everyone who isn't glued to the internet and in love with hot terminology of the year 2014 (like I am), RBF means resting bitch face. Aka you look mean all the time even if you're really only mean half of the time (like I am). Resting bitch face is great for riding public transit because then weirdies are slightly less likely to talk to you, but it's really bad when you have no friends and are trying to look appealing to any and all 20-something strangers at Starbucks in the hopes they will find your mildly-pleasant face worth spontaneously chatting to.

What has changed? Now I just look for other people with RBF and know that those are the people I want to befriend. Birds of a feather flock together.

NOTE TO SELF NO. 2:

Now this is obviously not a very polite note, but when you put quotation marks around something it means it has to be factual and that is really what I wrote. I'm sorry I didn't know that in the future I would be putting the verbatim truth of my profane notebook on the internet. 

Anyways I have a nervous yawn which is a really terrible habit and clearly it was ruining my life enough that I needed to write it down to remind myself that it existed (how could I ever forget?). Any time something important is happening, I'm probably yawning. Job interview? Yawning. Going on a date? Yawning. Listening to my doctor talk to me about my health? Yawning.

What has changed? Unfortunately not a lot. The nervous yawn has not miraculously disappeared in the 365+ days since internhood, but it is not as much on the forefront of my mind as it was every day at my internship when I was getting design feedback and in constant fear of yawning in my art director's face. 

NOTE TO SELF NO. 3:

Was this the beginnings of a haiku? I don't know. But the first couple of weeks of my internship, I didn't have a desk. I sat in a strange red pod which was basically like a gussied-up cubicle. And then sometimes I sat on a couch in front of a table. And then one day I came back to where I was sitting at the couch and the table was gone and my laptop was on the couch. WHAT! I know—I was also shocked. I stood there and side-eyed my fellow office workers for a bit and then just sat on the couch because no one had immediately presented themselves as the table-heisting menace. I was the couch intern. It was like a game of musical chairs, except I was the only playing and people were just removing my seating options from the office one-by-one. There was also no music playing.

What has changed? Well now I sit at a desk. I can leave my belongings on it and they don't go anywhere. And no one has taken my chair. Yet. 

NOTE TO SELF NO. 4:

"People buying condoms. Me buying Ben & Jerry's."
Apparently I took this very important note down to remind myself of a time when I felt ultra-pathetic. Because I'm masochistic in that kind of way. Nothing like reinforcing the memory of your lowest lows by writing them down in your 'creative safe space'.

 Around nine one night, I walked downstairs to the Walgreens to get a pint of ice cream. Walking to John's $1 Scoops around the corner would simply not cut it. Some scoops, John?! Get real. This was a Ben & Jerry's kind of night. I needed the pint. So after spending too much time having the classic internal debate about chunky monkey vs. phish food, I got in line to check out (don't worry, I went with the chunky monkey, as one always should). I distinctly remember looking down at my Chacos and my should-never-be-worn-outside tie-dyed shorts and then looking up to see a couple directly in front of me in line, tittering into each other's ears with a single box of Trojans between them. And not even the small, "we're not sure if this is gonna be happening on the regular" kind of box. Like the monster-sized "we're probably going to be having a lot of sex, you should watch out" kind of box. I think we had different kinds of plans for the night. 

What has changed? Obviously now I have much classier taste and only get my ice cream from Bi-Rite. My palette has matured in a year. 

NOTE TO SELF NO. 5:

Clearly my comforter was causing some major self-reflection. But really that is the only natural reaction to have when the first thing you do out in the "adult" world is start sleeping on a twin-size mattress with the same bedding you used at age 7. Especially when it's a dainty floral print quilt in pastel pinks and greens. Guaranteed quickest way to regress 15 years. It wasn't awesome.

What has changed? A year has been enough time for me to double the size of my mattress and purchase some stereotypically millennial Ikea/Target/West Elm bedding. I no longer have to feel my toes dangle over the edge of the bed or explain to people why my room looks like a JC Penney catalog from 1999. Definitely move in the right direction, I'd say.

Laundry: A How To Not Guide

Until recently I was convinced I had adulthood figured out. This is because I had a foolproof plan for laundry—or more so to avoid laundry (because the key to adulthood is laundry). It was like this: every other time I was getting close to needing to wash a load, I would just buy more underwear, thus incrementally increasing the number of days I could go without doing laundry. It was brilliant. 

Or at least it was brilliant until last weekend when I made my Sunday pilgrimage to Get the Funk Out—the friendly neighborhood laundromat. I prefer to walk directly across the street and pay twice as much to use the machines there because using the washer/dryers in my building would mean two things:

a) saying many tiny prayers that the machines are actually free and available for use. Eighteen 2-bedroom apartments sharing two washers and dryers are really abysmal odds.

b) saying another set of tiny prayers as I walk down the perilously small and steep back steps into our strange semi-outdoor, semi-subterranean basement/laundry/trash/bike zone. If I'm going to break an ankle I want it to be terribly dramatic and make a great story, not that I tripped while carrying an unwieldy bag of dirty laundry down some creepy stairs.

So I take my laundry business elsewhere. Also because I want to support wordplay (Get the Funk Out - like hellooooo?). On this particular Sunday it just so happened that every other person in the city of San Francisco also decided to do their laundry at Get the Funk Out. The sheer proximity of this laundromat to my apartment had lulled me into a (deluded) sense of ownership—as if I was the only person ever to use Get the Funk Out. After I shimmied past the strange proliferation of wheelie laundry carts that are always in the way but never actually being used, I start unloading and half-heartedly sorting my pounds of laundry. I say half-heartedly because towards the end I always start losing track of how I was sorting it in the first place and just try to make the washers look even. I wouldn't really recommend this method. 

It's in the midst of maxing out my second washer that I realize I've run into trouble. The depths of my laundry basket are never ending. I keep reaching in and just pulling out more underwear. Like pairs I didn't even remember buying. It was like a magician reaching into his sleeve and pulling out that colorful strand of scarves that just keeps going and going and going and going, except this was my hamper and there was just more and more underwear at the bottom of it. I had reached the terminal velocity of my underwear purchasing. I had overdone it. I honestly would have used a third washer had it been available JUST FOR UNDERWEAR. Do you know how much underwear one person has to acquire before it becomes near-impossible to complete laundry in a single day? I do now. And it's an obscene amount. 

By the grace of God I managed to surreptitiously cram all of my undergarments (plus normal amount of clothes) into into two washers (good thing I said all those tiny prayers earlier) against the warning of the  "DO NOT OVERFILL MACHINE" signs posted everywhere. Pshhhhh, do I look like a laundry rookie to you?

And then I realize I didn't bring any quarters. Because I don't have any quarters. So I take the only bill out of my wallet (a $10) and go to the dreaded change machine. I hate the change machine. I hate it like I hate the garbage disposal, the blender, and the vacuum. They're all too much noise. Do you know how many quarters it takes to make $10? A fuck load. Do you know how long it takes to dispense a fuck load of quarters from the change machine? Me neither but it felt like 4 minutes of CLANGING AND CLANGING in the silent laundry monastery that is Get the Funk Out. At this point I'm willing to admit I looked like a laundry rookie.

I take my cupped handfuls of quarters (because $10 of quarters is too much for me to even carry in a single hand!) back to my stupid, basically overflowing washing machines and proceed as planned. I return to the washers 40 minutes later and feel nearly elated to see that there aren't suds pouring out of my machines nor is there a small motor fire that needs addressing. A laundry miracle you could say (this laundry experience had really taken a religious turn). 

The truest moment of shame came when I had to carry my washer contents to and from the dryer multiple times and proceeded to drop at least 10 pairs of underwear in front of the entire city of San Francisco congregated at the laundromat whilst doing so. For a person who owns that much underwear, my tolerance for embarrassment is very low. 

In summation, it turns out that there is such a thing as too much underwear (I know, I am shocked about this too). And that buying more underwear to avoid laundry doesn't mean that I will ultimately never have to do laundry again. In fact it means that when I do get around to doing laundry, it will be torturous. However, I've formulated this handy equation to help you if you find yourself nearing the underwear abyss: if (time + energy) x embarassment is less than the number of pairs of underwear you have, STOP BUYING MORE.

You're welcome. 

Cake cake cake cake

A few months ago it was my birthday and my really wowza friends sent a whole entire cake to me at work. It was awesome, but also not awesome because I kind of started crying at my desk a liiiiiitle bit and, as previously discussed, crying on public transit isn't cool and it turns out crying at work isn't cool either. In fact, it's worse. I pulled myself together.

So anyways, great. I've got one more year of life, and now I also have a cake to myself which I promptly bring home in its sweet lil pink box. I have a piece of cake that night (carefully slicing around the "#HBDelaney" written in icing on the top) but then realize that while I have no qualms with slowly eating an entire cake by myself, maybe I shouldn't be such a selfish B and should probably bring the cake back to work the next day to share. 

Let the record show at this point, that while I am only one girl, the prospect of eating a whole cake by myself was not a matter of "if", but of "should". Should I eat a whole chocolate-coconut-buttercream-#HBDelaney cake? Probably not. Could I? Fucking yes.

The next morning, in my incredible foresight and planning, I set the cake in it's adorable box and matching paper bag (what is a cake without coordinating accessories?) and place it next to my bedroom door so there is no way I can forget said cake. On the way to my bus stop I make a crucial misstep that leads to the dramatic climax of this story — I go down into the MUNI Metro station to refill my Clipper card so that I don't ride the bus without paying and continue to be a very upstanding citizen. But also so that I don't get caught and get a $100 fine. 

I pay a stupid amount of money to purchase my pass for this godforsaken system of mass transit, dash out of the underground MUNI station back to my bus stop, catch the number 22 just in time, and settle in for my 45 minute ride with the unruly middle school youth of SF that I share my morning commute with. 

Approximately, T-minus 10 minutes until my arrival at work I make a grave discovery. The #HBDelaney cake is not with HBDelaney aka the birthday girl aka me. I know what you are thinking right now because I am thinking it too: FUCK.

At this point in time, I was also having a nice text chat with my pal New York Jason. There's no better way to pass 45 minutes on the bus than by slowly working your thumbs into an arthritic stupor by texting. Our conversation at the moment of Cake Crisis 2015 looked kind of like this:

Needless to say, I was shocked and also upset and also guilty for the following reasons:

a) I don't lose shit. I am great at keeping track of belongings and also it was a CAKE. In a BAG. With HANDLES FOR CARRYING WITH ME AT ALL TIMES.

b) I just lost a delicious cake. A cake that was once entirely mine and was no doubt going to continue being delicious while I ate it throughout the day. Any dessert opportunity lost should be mourned. 

c) My friends had just bought me a fancy cake and I had just wasted their effort and cold hard post-grad cash. Not cool. 

Immediately after confessing my cake sins, I moved into the immoral pleading stage where I tried to tell Jason this was a horrible secret and no one could know. If I wasn't going straight to cake hell for losing the damn thing, I was certainly going for trying to cover it up and taking accomplices with me. 

So I mope my way to work lamenting the loss of the cake in a hyperbolic way. I was going through the seven stages of grief and hoping acceptance would come soon. I had left the cake in that dank, sad MUNI station in my inane desire to buy a bus pass. I could just envision it sitting there near the turnstiles, slowly absorbing the urine scent of all MUNI stations, passerby side-eyeing it skeptically and wondering if such an innocent looking package could maybe contain a bomb.

Do you know how many times someone has ever asked to verify I paid my fare to ride the bus? Zero. Do you know how many times I have lost a cake because I was trying to abide by the law? Once. This was clearly public transit's fault.

I went through the day under a gray, cake-shaped cloud. To say I sulked would be an understatement. I arrived home. And then I sent Jason this text:

I was a horrible idiot. The cake was still in its pink bag in its matching box sitting next to my door. While the moral of the story may initially seems to be "Never pay to use the MUNI", further consideration leads me to believe it's really "When your friends give you a cake, keep it to yourself". I'd like to blame public transit, but really I'm going to blame generosity.

Next week, I'll tell you about the appointment I had with a brain doctor to see if I should be concerned that I falsified a very elaborate and convincing memory of leaving home with the cake. (Just kidding).

New-Adult Ennui

Things that have happened since I last wrote a blog post (please refer back here for the golden years of Del's blogging, aka ages 19 through 21):

Felt guilty about not writing any blog posts. 
Graduated. 
Moved to San Francisco. 
Interned and then was a contractor and then turned down a job and then "freelanced" (what designers get to call unemployment). And then got hired again. Don't worry, I work now. I even have my own health insurance (how I really know I'm an adult).

Crazy how easy it is to sum up a year of life, huh? 

Fortunately a year of life as a twenty-something in San Francisco has also been more than enough time to feel all the feelings of absolute bewilderment and lack of direction that every postgrad feels. Here's the highlight reel of some moments during which I realized I am really living on my own in San Francisco and have contributed to my sense of new-adult ennui:

Crying on the MUNI (not the same as crying in the car). 
I take public transit just like any other exceedingly hip urban city dweller, which means that I no longer have the luxury of crying in my car. Don't tell me you've never cried in your car on the way home from work? From high school? Nothing is more cathartic than having a terrible day and then getting in your car and having a nicely contained and self-indulgent pity party. News flash: IT'S NOT THE SAME TO BE THE CRYING GIRL ON THE SUBWAY. I've tried it, and it was fucking awkward. Then I thought about if it was worth a $7/hour rental of the ZipCar. And then I realized my life as an exceedingly hip urban city dweller had come down to considering paying money to rent a car to drive around and cry. (And could I possibly make an app for this?)
 

Trying to buy granola. 
My trips to the grocery store take 1.5x as long as my grocery store trips in St. Louis because I have to spend an extra 30 minutes in the granola aisle (because there is an ENTIRE AISLE OF GRANOLA) looking at the approximately 8 billion variations on oats being sold to me because I live in a place where people are cuckoo for granola. WHY. Why can no decisions be simple? Do I want fruit and nut honey oat? Or do I want double cinnamon chocolate crunch? Why won't someone just sell me something called "basic granola"? Where did all this granola verbiage come from? And then after I ask these questions to myself I realize my 30 minutes of confusion are up and I usually leave without granola.
 

Licking a seat on BART.
A friend once told me that studies have found every disease known to man on the upholstery of the BART seats. While that sounds like a really great urban legend, I also believe it. It's sweaty, it's full of people, it smells. I have never been more convinced I was staring at a dead body than when I rode the BART for 35 minutes watching a man sleep entirely motionless before he jolted awake at the 24th Street station and continued with his day. The BART is no Disney Monorail. 

So anyways here I am getting out at my friendly 16th Street BART station ('friendly' meaning I've become used to the pervasive scent of urine and am no longer afraid of the woman angrily preaching at me in Spanish through a megaphone), and immediately catch a whiff of the heavenly pupusa cart a mere block away. Pupusas are like an extra-thick Salvadoran quesadilla and probably the cheapest street food in SF. I would say I succeed in resisting the pupusa cart 1 out of every 5 times I walk past it. And this time was not my designated 1 out of 5.

The pupusa is also not a silverware kind of food. You get it on a paper plate, you kind of roll it like a taco and you go on your merry way. On that day, I had essentially exited a human-sized petri dish and proceeded to eat straight out of my hands. Somehow it wasn't as satisfying to lick my fingers after that pupusa because I was struck with the image of licking the BART upholstery instead. Which is essentially what I was doing. My immune system is now built like a brick house.

Knowing strangers are probably going to see your (my) underwear. 
There are three reasons why this is true.

1. It's windy AF in San Francisco and my body hates pants. This means I wear dresses. The amount of times my butt has been flashed in public is not as bad as the time I walked the 15 minutes from my apartment to my typography class with my dress caught in my backpack last year and then tweeted an apology to campus, but also not as good as when it's socially acceptable for everyone else to see your underpants like on Pride or Bay to Breakers. 

2. The towels at my gym cover 20% of your body and probably dry less than that. It's a locker room and underwear sightings are a given. But let's all say a little prayer and hope I don't see any coworkers.

3. My kitchen and living room windows look directly into the kitchen and living room windows of my neighbors. Which is 5 feet away. For the first 3 weeks I was REALLY, REALLY good about wearing pants in the apartment. But if you can't go around pants-less on a Sunday morning in your own home, where can you?! No where that I know of. If you haven't tried making oatmeal in your underwear, you're missing out. I think it makes it taste better.

Obviously lots of important stuff has been happening in my postgrad life — crying, germs, public transit (as usual). Stay tuned for further intensely analyzed daily minutiae.