The Official Guide to Dating a Lehrer

A few days ago, I found myself in a situation with my brother, his girlfriend, and my boyfriend. For the purposes of this discussion, let’s call them Michael, Rachel, and Matt, respectively. Michael and I were talking about something that only people in our family would understand (okay, I’m not going to lie, we were reading bits of Torah that we had memorized over the years [see rule #7 below]). Rachel and Matt looked at each other with a “What in the world are we doing dating these losers?” kind of expression.

It occurred to me that maybe other things that Michael and I do are foreign to our dates, and even to our close friends. Even if you don’t currently fit one of those categories, this may, one day, explain many things about Michael and me. So do keep reading.

The Official Guide to Dating a Lehrer

1. You will become a part of our family, whether you like it or not.

2. Our dad makes a lot of jokes. Just laugh at them. They’re usually mostly funny.

3. Our mom is a really good cook. We will never know whether you’re dating a Lehrer because you like us or because you like our mom’s food.

4. If you don’t watch Seinfeld, we won’t necessarily excommunicate you, but you will just not understand 90% of the things we say.

5. You will watch a LOT of Jeopardy! episodes.

6. You will become extremely knowledgeable in our synagogue’s politics.

7. We impress each other by showing off how much Torah we have memorized. We may recite this in your presence. If this is the case, just know that you will never understand us.

8. You will become very close with your boyfriend/girlfriend’s sister/brother.

9. We stay up really late at night (except for our mom, who goes to bed at 9:30 p.m.). When given the opportunity, then, we will stay up as late as humanly possible. Learn to follow our schedules.

10. No, we have never owned a bird. My mom just likes collecting birdhouses. We don’t get it either.

11. Between the four of us, we have people that can play clarinet, bass clarinet, tenor saxophone, bassoon, PVC Organ (”fwap-o-phone”), tuba, piano, and vocals. Of those, the bassoon is the most painful. We warned you.

And there you have it: 11 simple guidelines for understanding the enigmas that are Michael and Lia Lehrer. Enjoy!

Distraction-less distraction?

Someone suggested to me the other day that I should write my paper in the study lounge or the library to avoid distractions.

What I have come to realize, though, is that I need those distractions.

When I’m in a blank, quiet room, I can’t help but thinking to myself how blank and quiet it is. I’ll look around, trying to think of other things on my mind. I may fall asleep, but chances are that my paper will not get written. Instead, I will go insane.

I have learned to understand the importance of working in “chunks.” Do a little bit of an essay, go online for a bit. Do a little bit of Hebrew homework, snack for a bit. Do a little bit of neuroscience reading, nap for a LOT. If the phone rings, I’ll answer it. If I get an IM (though lately they’ve been mostly “young 18/f/IL who want to meet me…”), I’ll look at it. If I hear interesting conversations going on next door that I have to strain to eavesdrop, I’ll walk over there to listen. My essays get written, my homework gets done, my reading gets (mostly) done. It’s all about the chunks.

I’ll admit, though, that I only went online once yesterday for five minutes, and not at all today until I completed my paper, and it got done very efficiently. Maybe the key is to do the work in chunks, but not with an away message on?

I should go read my Hebrew Literature book…okay, after this chunk of distraction time.

The messy room: the follow-up post

Before I get to the new developments in the status of the cleanliness of room 101, let me remind you of what my dorm room looked like just two days ago (also see my previous post).

The following picture was staged, but it accurately shows what COULD have happened if room situations had not improved.

Hannah could have fallen off her bed comfortably, without hurting herself, onto her mountain of stuff.

But, alas, that did not happen.

Apparently, my blog entry must have had some impact on Hannah. I came home from band yesterday afternoon to find the room looking like this:

Had the force field reversed itself? Did the room suddenly tip over in the other direction? I could not believe it. Was I on another floor? Was I in a different dorm? Was I at a different campus? If I was, how would my key have worked? I was in shock.

The best part, however, was this note I found on my bed:

I don’t know what to make of all this, but I thought that I should to post it all to be fair.

The messy room

Hannah, my lovely roommate: if you’re reading this, please don’t take offense. I kid because I love.

So lately, I’ve noticed an unusual phenomenon in my room. It’s really not like this in other rooms; it must just be room 101.

There seems to be some kind of force field–an imaginary line, if you
will–that shoves all of the mess and clutter onto Hannah’s
half of the room.

It must be all the magnets that Hannah has that attract the piles of clothes, towels, books, water bottles, clothes, boxes, clothes, blankets, and more clothes to her side. I don’t know what else could explain it.

Maybe we should get a janitor or an RA or something to check out our room. Wait…I know what it is. Our room must be on a slant! That’s it! Yes, our room is slanted downward towards the right side, so both of our messes fall to her half. I knew there was always a scientific explanation for everything.

I’ll admit that occasionally, the force field is weak, and the clutter crosses a little farther over the yellow line than it should. I help retain the balance by gently shifting the clutter back to the right side of the imaginary line. Less frequently, the slant disappears and both sides are equally (well, maybe not EQUALLY) messy. That situation is caused by the force field being pushed too far to the right to the point that it becomes the wall, reverses its direction, and causes room 101 (our room) to be messy and room 102 (Shari and Jessi’s room) to be completely clean. That’s only happened a few times, though.

I don’t know what to do about this force field. Not only does the mess not cross over the line, but I cannot cross over the line myself. When I do, it’s like a game of Minesweeper, stepping on book corners and belts.

I’m just glad that I live on the right side (er…the “correct” side…the left side) of the force field.

156

I don’t get mail very often here at school (with the exception of the bus schedules and the flyers telling me how I can seek psychological help), but I got an interesting package the other night.

For some reason, I felt obliged to check the mail Saturday night as I passed by the mailboxes (the room 101 mailbox was calling my name: “Open me, Lia!”) with some of my Schechter friends who were visiting me for the night.

Sure enough, I received a package, from my parents. My mom feels sorry for me that I don’t get mail, so she’ll occasionally send a card that says, “Hi, you’re a really great person, we miss you!” or something like that.

But it was not a card like that.

I opened the package to find these contents:

Inside the envelope (addressed to “Ms. Lia Lehrer”), there was another envelope with my name on it, a card with a sunflower on it, and a sock–yes, one sock–taped to a piece of cardboard.

The card read: “[printed:] Wishing you sunshine…[written in:] and enough socks! Enjoy winter quarter. We love you. -Mom & Dad”

Apparently, when I did laundry at home the last night of break, I left a sock in the dryer (as I often do). Because I lose a sock almost every time I do laundry, I have quite a sock shortage. My mom, realizing that, wanted to do everything she could to make sure that my feet don’t freeze.

I think that when I was folding laundry at home, however, I noticed that I had an extra sock, and I either threw it away or just didn’t bring it. Why would I bring an extra sock to school? Would the missing sock appear in my dorm room?

Mom and Dad, thanks for the sock. But next time, can you maybe send me two?

Winter Quarter ‘06

Here are my classes for winter quarter, and some thoughts on how they’ve been so far:

Freshman Seminar: Explorations of Misperception
Tuesday/Thursday, 4:00-5:20 p.m.
A class of 15 kids, four of whom I have previously been in classes with (either at Northwestern, Niles West, or even Niles North). It’s an inter-disciplinary class in history and neuroscience, taught by two teachers. We’ll be talking about “misperceptions” in tourism of cities (the history component), and the “misperceptions” our brain experiences when it senses an object. It sounds really interesting.

Hebrew II
Monday/Wednesday/Friday, 11:00-11:50 a.m.
A continuation of the class I took last quarter. (Though we lost one student, so there’s only four of us.) I like Hebrew.

Editing and Writing the News: Lecture
Tuesday, 9:00-11:00 a.m.
The journalism class. Let me tell you, 9:00 a.m. is WAY too early to have a TWO-HOUR lecture. But it seems sort of interesting. There are maybe 120 students in the class–by far my biggest class this quarter. About 15-20 of those are my friends from my dorm, so it’s fun. We have to take current events quizzes (which is sort of good, because otherwise I probably wouldn’t read the newspaper), spelling tests (I haven’t done that since fifth grade…), grammar tests (I love grammar!), and other fun things.

Editing and Writing the News: Lab
Wednesday, 6:30-9:30 p.m.
The lab component of the journalism class. (Three hours long, in case you didn’t note the time.) There are 15 kids in the class, eight of whom are not in Medill (the journalism school), so I don’t feel like an outcast in the class. Normally, we’ll get a story assignment at the beginning of class, and then have three hours to interview people, gather information, and write a good story. I felt really good in the class tonight. It’s been a while since I’ve been in a formal journalism environment, and it felt right to be there. So we’ll see how this class goes, though I still don’t see myself necessarily transferring into Medill.

Modern Hebrew Literature in Translation
Monday/Wednesday/Friday, 9:00-9:50 a.m.
Ahh! Another 9:00 a.m. class! What am I doing to myself? This class has…get this…FOUR students. Four. The teacher is British and new to Nohhthwestahn. I really don’t know what to expect from this class. I just hope that it counts as an English distro (the comparative literature department hasn’t decided yet if it counts or not). The best part about today, though, was that we learned about the history of modern Hebrew literature, starting in Europe, and all that stuff. Then, two hours later, I went to Hebrew language class, and we learned the SAME THING, but in Hebrew! Weeeeird.

All of these classes are really close to my dorm, which is really exciting, especially for the winter. I have to deal with four 9:00 a.m. classes, but on Thursdays I don’t start until 4:00 p.m., and on Fridays I’m done at noon, so it’s not a bad schedule.

We’ll see how it goes!

Published!!

I knew this blog was good for something.

Remember that post I wrote about chicken soup from a cube? Koach, the Conservative Movement’s college program (where my dad is the webmaster), needed a “recipe” for this month’s online issue.

My dad suggested that they find a recipe that college kids can easily make in their dorms (as opposed to the previous recipes, like, “Hey, college kids! Learn how to make this fancy beef dish that only takes seven hours!”). Then he realized that I had already written it (the chicken soup “recipe”) in my Livejournal.

I made the piece into more of an article (I think it’s funny, but I think everything I say is funny), gave them a picture and my little bio. I’m really proud of it.

So, check out my first published article of my college career: http://www.koach.org/kocjan06recipe.htm

(Visit it and send it to your friends, too…if the Koach people see that the number of people viewing their website goes up when I write articles, maybe they’ll have me write more!)