Well, it's started. The Skinny Catch-22.

This is a very peculiar occurrence, wherein people who haven't seen you for awhile suddenly feel the need to tell you that you're looking SO GOOD. (Actually, the term of choice seems to be a startlingly random, "Hey, you look great!") However, what they really mean -- at least in this case -- is that you've lost a few pounds. Fact is, this sort of compliment is incredibly two-sided. When someone is complimented on weight loss, not only do they think, "Gee, I guess you thought I looked pretty not great before," but they also wonder why such an "accomplishment" should be rated important in the first place. Whatever happened to being healthy for healthy's sake? Why is the loss of a few pounds on the way to nutrition and actually-learning-how-to-cook such a terrific thing? Yet is it better not to notice, not to say anything? What kind of yutz complains about a compliment? Voila: the land of The Skinny Catch-22.

Thing is, I kind of miss those pounds. I don't miss being unhealthy, or never paying attention to how I treat my body-temple. But I definitely miss a few pounds, particularly the ones from a few choice places -- meaning the ones that made my clothes fit, you illicit gutter-heads. Perhaps these well-meaning Catch-22ers would do better to pony up cash for a new wardrobe instead. Because when in doubt ... uh ... spend money. Capitalism yay.

  From The Christa Dictionary:
      gorgeous. adj.
  1. describes a person of either sex who appears to be intelligent, humorous, altruistic, imaginative, magnetic, attractive. (See "dapper.")
  2. a compilation of everything that makes the heart go pitter-pat.

Wildly gorgeous people scare me.

And that's that, mattress man.

Someone needs to create a screensaver entitled "DANCE!"

It should be entirely composed of incredibly random dance sequences -- a montage of them, if you will. The dance sequence from Napoleon Dynamite should bookend it, and it should include shots from The Breakfast Club's library dance fest, Pulp Fiction's twist competition, the "Like a Virgin" sequence from Moulin Rouge, that one scene from Angel where the angsty leading-vampire himself imagines cutting a nerdly rug on the dance floor, something from Newsies, because let's face it, almost nothing is as cool as Newsies, Austin Powers' original opening dance number -- with the twisting policeman, a fellow who actually attended my university -- and just for the heckofit, something from the "Moses Supposes" number in Singin' in the Rain, because that's one of the best damn film musicals ever made, no matter how many times my film professors seemed to think I hadn't seen it before.

Also, Elaine's "little kicks" dance from Seinfeld.

Genius. Sheer, reflexive, intertexual genius.

And now from the quick n' random newsdesk:

1. Graduation is next month, and I can't even keep my mind on today.
2. Wildly gorgeous people scare me.
3a. Our campus library doesn't have any Sin City novels on hand.
3b. A fact which I find marvelously unfair.
4. I'm tired of being tired, and deep in thought over being deep in thought.
5. We need some good robot us-es to fight the bad robot us-es.

People used to say that I resembled Shirley Temple as a child -- which was rather amazing, seeing as my head of hair didn't truly emerge until I was nearly two. After taking so long to appear, my hair promptly made up for its unfashionably late arrival by growing in curls en masse: a good thing during the perm-ridden 80's, a bad thing during the beanstalk teenage years.

Much later, once I happened upon the swanky awesomeness of supercool glasses, The People™ began to say that I resembled Lisa Loeb. One sweetly misguided soul even compared my outer appearance to that of Lois Lane. (It's plain to see that the initials L.L. are not winning any prizes for clarity.)

Nowadays, long after my curly hair has calmed into manageable waves and my 20/15 vision no longer requires glasses, nobody says anything. Unless you count my shockingly recent overhearing of, "Man, Christa's hot." Which I don't think I should, because I promptly piped up, "Yeah, Christa is hot," nearly frightening both hapless, deluded, gossiping Silly Boys to death.

Clearly, a cynical piece of mind can trump celebrity any day of the week.

Recently I have been questioning my entire womanly existence.

Insofar, I've decided to keep at it. At existing, that is.

I think this bodes well.