pre-lecture pick-up

i'm giving a lecture tomorrow in the class i t.a. for, psychology of perception. i'm lecturing because the prof is out of town. when choosing a topic, we were apparently using the (crack-supported, no doubt) algorithm, pick the topic about which borogoves knows the least. we successfully ruled out all kinds of topics on which i might have some expertise, like vision and hearing (which i've heard about three times now, through taking and t.a.-ing this class) and speech perception (which is at least tangentially related to my area of research (which is psych of language, for those of you asleep at the back)), and decided on perception of internal state (e.g. hunger, thirst, fatigue, horniness, need to vomit (n.b. i think this would be a particularly good topic to lecture on to undergraduates, the need to vomit, but for the LIFE of me i can't find any research that has been done on it. i'd do the research myself, but really, who wants to work with vomit as a career...)).

not only do i know nothing about the perception of internal state, but apparently neither does anyone else, as it is a topic not to be found in most textbooks on perception. urg. so. this is fun.

anyway, i was sitting in starbucks, having a coffee (duh) and working on my presentation, when a guy about my age drops his stuff on the table next to me and strikes up a conversation. [hello? is my head not buried in the book i'm reading? am i not furiously writing down important facts about the hypothalamus and rats who drink too much saltwater?] anyway, he asks me all about what i'm doing, who i am, what's my raison d'etre at penn, etc, generally making it very clear that he's trying to pick me up [imagine. me. being picked up in a coffee shop, while my head is buried in a textbook on biological psychology and i'm clothed in what could be my pajamas (but aren't!). WHAT is the world COMING to?]

anyway, the point is (don't get excited, it's not going to be a very GOOD point) that i was totally uninterested. don't get me wrong, scott (the guy) was attractive, seemed intelligent, and was potentially interesting. i just wasn't interested. could be, of course, the fact that i'm rapidly approaching Major Freakout Land about this lecture (not only am i lecturing on this ridiculous topic, but did i mention that the prof wants me to spend half the time doing a review session (finals are approaching) in the form of a jeopardy game?), but i think it's that I LOVE KARL. i'm like a schoolgirl around him (oh, wait. i AM a schoolgirl. still. granted, i'm in 22nd grade, but hey, still in school is still in school, mais non? i don't know where all this french is coming from suddenly.)

i could be mistaken about this, of course, but i don't think i've ever been this in love before. not with ben or john. 'course, ben was so long ago (ummmm, 1992 i think) that memory has faded. might help that the sex is great. gets better and better. 'course, it's unclear whether that's because karl is a better lover than those i've had before, or because i'm more sexually sensitive/responsive (this could be--aren't women supposed to reach their sexual peak sometime in the late 20s/early 30s?), or something else. confounds--we avoid them in psych experiments, but you can't avoid them in real life. and you can quote me on that.

okay. i think that was all. i think the only point i was trying to get across was that i love karl. which, of course, you already knew. but i got so sidetracked by all the discussion of the lecture and the coffee shop pick-up that i forgot what the original point was gonna be. well, i'll just call it that so i can get back to work.