On This Week's Episode...

Hey-o! First things first, I have an update to share with you that I think you may find educational: Tastycake man is allergic to water. I know, right? Here's how I found out: I way down to the halls o' just-ice to deliver my very important packages and on the way back I swung by c-town to get my pastry fix--familiar story, no? Except this time is was raining and tastycakerbaker was nowhere to be seen. The only logical deduction is that rain + tastycake man = the Wicked Witch of the West. So I guess add rain to the cast of the upcoming feature film 'How to Crush My Hopes and Dreams.' Sigh. It's odd though, because rain is also a featured player in the long-running stage production 'The Best Day I Ever Had.' That guy's got serious range.

Today's going to be a jumble of sneeps and snoops because a) I've been out of the game for a little while and I need to get my mojo back, but more importantly b) it's getting to the end of the week and we all know what that means. Just like Novocain: give it time, it always works. Oh Denzel, oh inspirational sports movies, how well you know me.

Stop that! Bad Hare! No one is interested in your inarticulate grammarian ramblings! Get to the part. Okay, here goes. I know what you've all been asking yourselves lately: whatever happened to those class recaps you promised us? You're not going to go all pancakes on us, are you? No sir or madam I am not, because that would be lame to the capital oh and not at all how I roll. Wonder no longer, dear reader, because I am about to lay the updates on you like the low-fat veggie cream cheese on the sesame seed bagel of your hopes and dreams. Or the egg matzah of your hopes and dreams, for those of you Israelites out there (Chag Sameach!) I am a metaphor machine.

Okayokayokay. I'm en pointe now. As you may recall, in the last installment of our series (way, waaaaaay long ago) I introduced you to the full cast of our weekly drama, Night Class: This Time It's For Serious, so called for the following two reasons (Side note: instead of the word 'reasons' I just typed 'weekends.' What is that about? My brain works in mysterious ways, but sometimes I think I'm just trying to unnecessarily confuse myself. I guess 'reason' and 'weekend' sound vaguely similar? It's a stretch.):

1. Classes be at night, bitches. Also in my (delusional) mind my class is the physical manifestation of what would happen if you crossed Night Court and Welcome Back Kotter. Often times when I'm unsure how to proceed I simply ask myself, WWVBD? (What Would Vinnie Barbarino Do?) Then LB bangs her gavel and does some magic tricks for us. That whole scenario? Not entirely untrue.

2. Everyone (sans me) seems to be taking the material super seriously. Like, oh-my-god-if-you-don't-tell-me-the-exact-right-answer-I-will-shoot-you-in-the-face seriously. I understand if you're taking a class for a grade or credit or whateva, but this is just a voluntary course--we're not getting graded at all. Therefore I do not think it is reasonable to have an exorcist moment if I can't remember offhand why A=B in this scenario. I've made it a rule whenever possible to put at least two seats between myself and my neighbors in order to avoid being in the position of not knowing the precise answer to problem #157 from the homework two weeks ago lest I be mauled where I sit: BUT WHY IS IT A??? I DON'T UNDERSTAND. Chill, crazy lady, I have no clue what you are talking about, and you are getting your It's been a coppola weeks since then, so let's do a mid-season recap of what each of our favorite friends have been up to:

Princeton: grew a beard! I know, I know, TOTALLY UNEXPECTED. My first though though, was not 'wow, I did not expect you to grow a beard,' it was the far more logical 'wow, I did not expect that you knew how to grow a beard.' Because somewhere in the molasses swamp of my brainmatter I had squirreled away the knowledge that a) beard-growing is a time-learned skill, and b) prepsters cannot learn it. That's four quality years of grade-A college knowhow, right there folks.

Luckily he showed up to the very next class rocking the swankiest cloth belt embroidered with a pattern of--I kid you not--dancing elephants. Tastefully dancing elephants; I stand corrected. You called it, Hattie. So I decided on the basis of this couture de force to forgive his little hirsute experiment and then wham bam NO THANK YOU MA'AM he goes and shaves it all off again! I can only assume that he got tired of all his friends at the East Egg Country Club (literary reference, lolz!) inquiring about his facial growths and took a razor to it in desperation. Princeton, if I had only shared with you my secret blatant love of all things stubbly I'm sure you would have made a different decision and we could be honeymooning on your private island in the Caribbean RIGHT NOW. Alas, it was not meant to be. Poor Princeton, caught between two worlds.

Oleg: chugging along like the Trans-Siberian Railway, and by the looks of things loving it. I wish I could relate to you all of the wonderful pearls of wisdom that Oleg benevolently puts before us, undeserving though we mortals are, but it would take up too much post and probably give me carpal tunnel syndrome, so instead I'm just going to give you the following interchange between a random guy in the class and Oleg that I totally eavesdropped on overheard:

Random Guy: Oh, I see you brought gatorade, that's smart. I just brought water.

Oleg: Oh man, let me tell you. I used to bring like, so much water to every class, like SO MUCH. They used to call me Water Man.

RG: Oh, that's um...cool.

Oleg: That's not even it! I would also bring like, so many fruits, like so many fruits to every class. A whole bag of fruits. They used to call me Fruit and Water Guy!

RG: Haha...awkward...

Oleg: Oh yeah, I used to be super hydrated. But now I just drink alcohol like, all the time every day.

RG: (No response)

And..scene. If I had any doubts at that point about the street cred of my Comrade Oleg, they were firmly put to bed, tucked in, and red an extra bedtime story just in case. Any Russian who drinks 'all the time every day' can be my Russian.

Five O: Sadly, I don't have much to tell you about good ol' 5. He comes sporadically, seems lost/confused/unfocused/high most of the time he does come, and is clearly still my #1 favorite. I'm secretly waiting for the day he sits down next to me and asks me to be his lady friend. I live in hope.

Pearshape: As you can probably imagine, there's been a lot of activity in the Pearshape household, so rather than go into too much detail let me bullet point it out for you:

-Keeping the style going strong. No less than I would expect, but don't think it's easy to simultaneously dress like a toddler and an elderly woman. Pearshape brings her best game each and every day, and I respect that.

-Class romance! You heard me right, Pearshape and a certain gentleman are definitely sowing the seeds of more-than-friendship in the fertile ground of awkward classmate romance. Also known as: my favorite kind of romance. I don't know where this is going but I am 99.99% sure that it is somewhere in the vicinity of Amazazingtown, USA, and you know that is my hood.

-BUT WAIT, there's even more exciting Pearshape news! What could be more exciting than scholary hookups? Pots of gold? Alien abductions? Place a firm hold on your socks, dear reader(s) because there is a very real danger that they will be physcially rocked off because...

PEARSHAPE WORE A DIFFERENT SKIRT THE OTHER DAY

I KNOW!!!

I KNOW!!!

Phew, I got overwhelmed just thinking about it; good thing I was holding on to my socks. What kind of skirt you ask? Why the only kind befitting the shape of a pear: jean flavor. But wait, I hear you cry, that sounds suspiciously like the skirt we know and love, and to that I say MISTAKE! Because it was a FULL LENGTH JEAN SKIRT. BOOYAH. AND SCENE.