I spent a good part of yesterday feeling very 'punk rock', reading old copies of Cometbus (a really great zine by a punk guy in Berkeley) and listening to indie college radio. Oh, I am such a poseur. My dreams of punkdom were smashed further when I talked to Patrick, telling him what I had been up to, and his response was "But you're not a punk girl!"

Don't I know it.

Ah well, I quickly reverted to yuppie-in-training mode by working out at the gym for awhile, and then having dinner with Patrick at Cafe Latte, otherwise known as the Land of Yup. Fancy coffee drinks, extravagant desserts, the works. I hadn't realized how sick I was of being holed up in my room, so it was absolutely wonderful to sit in a cushy booth on the top level of the cafe, eating good food, drinking scads of coffee, people watching and cooing over the latest issue of PC World.

Patrick and I have decided that we're going to build an intranet in our house over the summer- he has a spare computer which he's going to convert to a linux box that will be our server, and we'll get a network hub and hook up all the computers in the house. At last count, we'll have at least as many computers as people, if not more. Why do I get the feeling that our house will be known as "Geek house"?

I just got a letter from Anne, mostly consisting of a description of her recent civil disobedience arrest. She's the one who 'converted' me to veganism in the first place, and now that she lives in New York, she's become extremely active in the animal rights movement. She's totally in her element now, and I am sometimes astounded at what she is willing to do. I'm incredibly proud of her for doing what she does, but simultaneously, her letters make me feel really guilty: I just don't have the drive to commit myself to a cause as she does. Yes, I'm politically active, far more so than most, and I spend probably 10 to 15 hours a week working on Queer Union and Amnesty International stuff; still, I can't say that I'm willing to do a lockdown, or get arrested. Reading her letter from the comfort of my tidy room, while sipping coffee and listening to music, only made me realize what a staid life I lead by comparison.

It's times like these that I have to remind myself that activism, though less blatant than Anne's, still makes a difference. I look back at what QU has accomplished this year, almost all of which I had a hand in, and I'm pleased. We do instigate change on this campus, and possibly the lives of the over 2000 members of the Macalester community. Even the act of walking down the street hand in hand with Liz, when we were dating, was an act of rebellion in this society. That's what it's all about, isn't it? Making a difference, making people think, in whatever way I can?

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Hearing: The Pixies, Doolittle.