Deep Thoughts: The Terrifying Experience Edition

• Professor comments: "Graduate school is a series of terrifying experiences" (yup); "You're approaching this paper like a journalist" (well...); "You are in the process of becoming world experts" (I feel more like I am in the process of failing statistics, but...).

• It is cold. In L.A. I am wearing a sweater. I put on the heat in my car. I did not bargain for this. I'm feeling sort of duped: I didn't move to L.A. to wear sweaters in October. If this continues, the only good thing about L.A. will be Coffee Bean (which is a really good thing, but I'm not sure it can justify the move).

• Having friends visit is fun. Hint, hint.

• People keep asking me what is the one thing I miss most about New York, and I feel sort of pathetic but the honest answer is that I miss feeling in my element. A friend in my program called it having her support network. It's sort of lonely to have to make Shabbos and yom tov plans every week, to know that when you're getting antsy at 10 p.m., your friends are on their way to bed, to be asked by your little brother, "Are you ever going to come see me?" <End feeling sorry for myself>

• Tar pits. They're smelly.

• Statistics. It's hard. I have stooped to ordering Statistics for Dummies books. We'll see if they help.

• Just about nine weeks in L.A. But who's counting? (I just looked at a calendar and realized it will be more than nine weeks before winter break. And then I freaked out. Time to look for cheap flights and a weekend I can leave for without failing school.)