Today's quote is again Oscar Wilde; his wit is seldom matched and never bested. One of his more pithy sayings: "The ugly and the stupid have the best of it in this world. They can sit at their ease and gape at the play. If they know nothing of victory, they are at least spared the knowledge of defeat."

Good afternoon, friends and fellow posters. Another day, another resignation to this depressing prospect humans have proclaimed life. Today I thought I might share with you my plans for the rest of the year, as the summer is quickly drawing to a close (although I still have about a month until I return to Pomona [for those not aware: I'm currently in Costa Mesa, where I live with my grandmother during the summer]).

I'm here until September 20, which gives me a little less than a week to prepare for the Fall quarter, which mainly consists of procuring textbooks, buying a new wardrobe, and applying to be a tutor at what is called "The Learning Center" at Cal Poly Pomona (basically, I help people with their English assignments, proofreading and generally offering my services and expertise in that area). My schedule is as follows:

Monday/Wednesday:
1400-1550: Development of Modern English
1600-1750: Shakespeare

Tuesday/Thursday:
0800-0950: Introduction to Astronomy
1300-1450: History of Western Art

I'm looking forward to my classes, aside from the fact that my Astronomy class requires me to wake up at an utterly godless hour of 6:30 a.m. two days a week (I'm not fond of competing with the sun to see who can get up earlier, you see), and I'm hoping to have the tutoring job (which begins at over $9/hr., but will probably only give me about 10 hours a week) and possibly a position at nearby Starbucks for evenings and weekends. We'll have to see just how strenuous this schedule is, but I think I can probably handle it—I've always wanted to work at Starbucks, after all.

Unfortunately, it looks as if I'll need two jobs during the school year, if I hope to pay for tuition and books (I'm not going anywhere near on-campus housing—alas, it looks as if my only option is to return to Pomona, tail firmly between legs, and see if I can't finagle an arrangement with my parents again) throughout the year: tuition alone has shot up nearly $200 since last year. To make matters worse, I've never been very good at not spending money, so I don't have quite as much as I thought I would from my job at Pipeline, despite a couple raises (and a promotion, for that matter). As it stands, an entire paycheck, the contents of my pitiful checking account, and $220 that my cousin Peter is generously floating me are all that's keeping me going to Cal Poly next quarter in the first place.

But even so, I think I'll do all right; and if not, there's always OCC, which I can attend while staying with my grandmother in Costa Mesa. Besides, in Orange County I have a good job at a local restaurant lined up (my manager at Pipeline, Jerry, also manages Newport Rib Company), so I can raise money for college. All in all, life isn't going nearly as badly as it could be—huzzah!

Well, I've probably bored you all enough for the day; I have nothing more to blather about at the moment, so I'll let you go. Anyone interested in contacting me, by the way (*cough*Juliana*cough*), is free to e-mail me at eljeffus@csupomona.edu. Unfortunately, as I haven't had access to my laptop all summer, I haven't been able to check my orpheum@att.net account, which has been steadily accumulating e-mail for months. There's a 10MB cut-off on the server, which, apparently, I reached a couple weeks ago—basically, anything you send to that account at this point will bounce right back at you. So use my school account, and I promise to reply within a couple days—I don't get to the library nearly as often as I probably should.

Until next we meet, I bid you all farewell. Toodles!

[Exit Orpheum.]