Jet Flu

6 AM China Air flight from Shanghai to Shenzen. Sleepy, grumpy, downgraded-to-coach sorebreK has the dreaded 'sandwich' seat. To the right, a grown man with zero snore and drool control. To the left, matronly New England mother of three teenage brats.

NE Mom: (smiles)
sorebreK: (pretends to fall forward in sleep)
NEM: (hint completely ignored) It's quite cold out there isn't it?
S: Uhuh?!
NEM: My son is studying Mandarin at the Peking University.
S: Wow - isn't that something? (Really wanting to say: sure it's just the Mandarin diploma that's standing between him and taking over from Wen Jiabao).
(S cursing under his breath for not remembering not to check in the earphones and eyeshades, quickly pulls out the flight magazine and starts flipping through it furiously)
NEM: Isn't that an interesting magazine? Never seen a flight magazine quite like that.
(S Wants to say 'sure, it's the bomb' or 'dynamite' - but being a middle-eastern looking guy on a plane, post 9/11, in a country where a flourishing trade in executed prisoner organs exists, he withholds any incendiary references).
S: Very. Can't put it down.
NEM: Wow, can you read Mandarin?
S: Not a word.
(NEM finally gets it. From an embarassed purple she turns a vindictive gray)
NEM: You must be from INDIA?!
S: Actually, it is Sri Lanka (uncomfortable with truth, S wants to say Oompa Loompa Land but realizes that his height would be a dead giveaway).
NEM: But you must be in computers(?)
(Now S really wants to euthanize this conversation)
S: No, as a matter of fact I work for the Sri Lankan government as an ornithologist. I study migratory patterns of birds in Asia. I'm on a field trip here. (this followed by a couple of racking coughs)
(Needless to say a death-like calm prevailed over the rest of the trip).

As I was telling i_will_make_it, these essays will be the end of me. Future SF Chronicle headline: "East Bay Man Found Dead. Double-Spaced Suicide Note". Almost done with the W essays - will send them into orbit mid-week. Two K essays slayed. The rest are pristine - I really will need to take time off work and stay grounded at home. Recommenders are such a pain too. It's a catch-22 - you want to get your recommendations from those who you've worked with closely, but well-meaning as they are, these are people who unlike your's truly like to work their heinies off. One HBS recommendation done; second one almost there and as for the third recommender, I've sent out an FBI APB to stage a nation-wide manhunt.

Wanting to catch a break from watching TV and browsing the Internet, went to see 'Pride & Prejudice'. Half-way through the movie I am sitting there thinking - there are 5 Bennett sisters and there are 5 schools I'm applying to. Will I be Bingley and get the unattainable Jane or will I be Darcy and get the intellectual but spunky Elizabeth or will I be Wickham and elope with Lydia or will I be clergyman Collins married to Mary (or was it Kitty - it doesn't matter) or will I be Darcy's horse (you should see him ride that thing). Come March, my life will be a play.