The Dawn Chorus

This post was originally intended to be a profound, deeply meaningful exploration of how the movie Bird Box is really a subtle mockery of the institution of religion.  This post was supposed to make readers question their reality and be the single most thought-provoking little corner of the internet that they had ever stumbled across. This post will be none of those things. The idea wasn't even my own - it came from my friend's advisor, and my friend briefly mentioned this to me when he called me during my ass-numbingly long car ride through Indiana to discuss how we'd store his furniture for the summer. I also happened to listen to a podcast during this same drive that used the phrase "the dawn chorus" to describe the sounds of birds welcoming a new day - and was thus inspired to start a blog. And that's it - a line from a podcast that I was only half paying attention to, and a passing thought passed onto me from a friend from his advisor - and those two things somehow had me convinced that my thoughts were worth sharing with the world. Turns out this is not the case. My thoughts are not revolutionary and my ideas are not innovative. I am painfully, constantly aware of everything about the world that I don't know. And I am trying to be okay with this reality. This reality is the same reality where I spent a half hour looking for a coffee shop in Omaha that stays open after 5pm AND has internet access (which is harder than you'd think, being in a relatively populated portion of the Midwest). And the same reality where I've had a paper open behind this browser window for about an hour with every intention to read it but - you guessed it - nope. I'm staring out the window, drinking lukewarm coffee, and thinking about where I can go to get a cactus for my room (I finally have a window that faces south - I can't just not get plants).

Also, my god, academics have such a thing for Thai food. Not that I spend excessive amounts of time being taken out to lunch by experts in hearing science, but every time I have, Thai food has been involved, as well as inevitable criticisms of the general American population being intolerant of spicy food, which is followed by me being self-conscious about my intolerance of spicy food, and then by me ordering food that is way too spicy to overcompensate and win over these important people. It was a sweaty day. What an exciting life.