things I have been doing:

• vastly enjoying most of what I've been downloading.
  
• downloading some more stuff:
  
  
  • Slint - Spiderland
    
  • ...and you will know us by the trail of dead - Worlds Apart and Madonna
    
  • What's Up Matador (the tenth anniversary collection)
    
  • The Arcade Fire live at KEXP (which sounds good, but the quality is terrible)
  
  
• studying for midterms.
  
• being all religious-like; the last week or so has been the build-up to the hindu new year, and yesterday was new years proper, so it's been a lot of interesting stories and praying and hearing from family and whatnot. it's not a big huge thing, but it makes me shuffle the rest of my life around enough that I'm glad it's once a year.
  
• realizing that my ...Trail of Dead shirt has a scene from the Mahabharata (lit trans: big war; it's an ancient Hindu epic poem) on it. and by me I mean my mom. I think this means that she approves of the band a little more. woo!
  
• drooling over this laptop company
  

also, I've been cooking again. Most recently, I made this pineapple-coconut terrine/jello thing, the recipe for which I got here.
It tasted good, but didn't look nearly as good as that guys photo; I think that I might not have reduced the pineapple juice enough. Oh well.

also dug out the trusty cilantro pesto recipe, which is simple and fast and adds a swath of green to stodgy winter meals.
to make, take:

• one bunch cilantro, cleaned and trimmed
• two large cloves of garlic
• 1 tbsp lemon juice (about half a lemon)
• a handful of nuts or seeds; I've made it with pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, pine nuts, peanuts and pistachios before.
• salt, to taste.
• about a quarter-cup of oil; whatever you like best.

throw everything but the oil in a blender. blend, adding oil until it becomes a smooth mixture, not necessarily a paste.

from there, the possibilities are huge; I like spreading it onto whole-wheat bread and making grilled cheese sandwiches, or tossing it with noodles and vegetables, or making nachos with it. the pesto tastes better after a day, and the proportions and ingredients are fairly flexible, so make it your own.

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random question: what shade of blue do you think a super-intelligent shade of blue would be? a navy blue? an ice blue? a sky blue? it's sort of for a shirt.