jessilevine's blog

This week, I had s’mores on the brain.

Correction: S’mores, George Washington docu-dramas and no cashiering on the brain.

We’re into July, now, guys. We’re almost there. By the time we start back up at school in the fall, we will have survived our first internship.

And, largely, I’m pretty stoked about my experience.

Like shoving a wooden spoon through lumped butter and sugar, time is churning at an ungodly slow pace, here. Enter Garden State airplane scene; Zach Braff is staring moon-eyed as faceless people bump up and down the aisle in hyper speed. Cue Frou Frou.

I’ve been following a blog called “All Cakes Considered” on AnnArbor.com for the past few weeks. Blogger Erin Mann’s got a plan: one cake baked for every week of the year. She posts her results—good or bad—online for us hungry readers to digest. Cool, eh? And, boy, Mann does it all: rum cakes, almond and sour cream pound cakes, Stewed Yard peach cakes, Spanish meringue cakes, tunnel fudge cakes, key lime cakes, coffee cakes…you name it.

Literally, the woman’s got it.

I’ve just been dropped 400 feet from a helicopter into the red zone: London’s Piccadilly Circus.

Landing like Cat Women on top of a (moving) fish delivery truck, I scout out our rally point. I see it, there, through the elbowed arm of the Circus’ Eros statue. The truck driver pulls to a stop—he wasn’t too pleased with me—“what’cha there!”—and I swing down. I sprint, and yank out my BlackBerry from my Northface backpack (one that’s equipped for intense mountain-scaling, mind you).

When I was in seventh grade, I decided to join Discovery Middle School’s track and field hurtling squad. I figured this would be the best way to get Robert’s attention; he was our team’s star sprinter, and, boy, did I think he was a dreamboat. I had fantastical visions of me busting through an imaginary finish line to tumultuous applause (cue "Chariots of Fire"), of Robert waiting at the track fence on a white horse, reading Romeo and Juliet.

Mysteriously, he spoke with a British accent. Odd.

LADY GAGA UPDATE:

Lady GaGa herself helped the sign language department costume their “Bad Romance” music video. It says so in the creds.

That’s all. That’s all I’ve got for today. Thank you, and goodnight!

Just kidding.

Another week, come and gone; I’m starting to really groove here at Madonna. I’ve even located the students’ hangout, the Take 5 lounge—past the prayer room, and down the Martin Luther King, Jr. and Karl Marx hallway (say, what?)—which whips up a damn good grilled cheese sandwich. Pair that with a fruit cup, and I’m made in the shade.

I like to leave my office door open when I’m at Madonna University.

Why?

Across the hall and next to the prayer room, Yu-Jo Grace Philson, director of the International Students Office, was yesterday speaking rapid Mandarin to two students from China. On my way to the bathroom, I passed Sister Mary Carolyn’s door. When I waved, she smiled and said hello. And, as I’ve taken Vice President Kenney’s old office (a setup similar to Dwight Schrute’s MegaDesk), people have popped in looking for him. They’ve all been very friendly.

Edit: Please see my more detailed post in our class's BB Discussion Board. Thank you!

Last week, I sat in on a staff meeting. Legit, right?

Madonna University’s entire Office of Undergraduate Admissions (OUA) staff filed into a classroom made Donald Trump-style boardroom a few minutes after 2:00. They were all late. I got to the meeting early, though, and as most of the OUA staff hadn’t even met me, they thought that they had walked into the wrong room.