Dum dum da-dum! After months of waiting, Happy Fun World is finally getting an oil change. I'm updating the pages, moving them to Coveworld.net, and even writing a new rant. All this change is really quite fitting and symbolic, because I'm writing this just two days before I officially start my academic career at Northwestern University. That's right, I'm now living and breathing in Evanston, Illinois, future home of me for the next four years. It's very unique, and the fun has been generally living up to the hype. I'm really quite happy with everything, but it is weird, and not for the most obvious reasons. Yes, it's weird living in a completely new environment where I don't have my own bathroom. Yes, it's weird to not have my parents around. And yes, it's weird that New Student Week is about to end and college life will suddenly be filled with strange monsters called "classes" and "homework". But mostly, it's weird making friends.

After six years of school in the same place, and eight years of summer in the same place, I'm finally in a new place where I don't have any automatic friends. I'm making friends, and I'm making oodles of friendly acquaintances, but it's just not quite the same. In some ways it's good not to have such a long history with everyone I meet. (Believe it or not, I wasn't too cool in seventh grade, and everyone in my high school knew that.) Here at Northwestern, people can see my naturally charming and mature self without worrying about my sometimes shady past. But at the same time, this is the only place where people stare at me for singing the Johnny O'Neal song in public. And they're less tolerant of long, pointless anecdotes. And if I meet someone for the first time on a day when I'm boring or ugly, I've forever ruined any chance for even a platonic relationship.

Another problem with the situation is that I'm surrounded by people who are dealing with the same issues, so I can't trust anyone to be themselves, so I don't really have a good system for judging whether or not people are cool. Without referring to specific examples that could get me in trouble, there were at least three distinct occasions when my opinion of a person completely reversed between my first and second encounters with them. There's no scientific procedure for picking the nicest people, and I don't have any mystical "vibe" that tells me when somebody's not going to be boring. So I'm shooting in the dark, and I don't have time to meet everybody twice.

The one reassuring aspect of this universal weirdness is that it means we're all in the same boat, so we've all got at least one thing in common. We're all trying to find friends, and trying to engage in conversations more meaningful than the usual exchange of names, majors, residence halls, and home towns. Now that we've all registered for classes, we can talk about those, too. I'm hoping that actually taking the classes will provide material for a whole new world of conversation about teachers and homework. I shouldn't make fun of such discussions for being shallow, because they really are useful. They make it easier to start a real conversation, and it's always good to have something in common with everyone you meet.

I'm a firm believer in the idea that it's much easier to get along with someone who you understand, and you can only understand someone if you know things about them. Apparently, not everyone realizes this, because few people invite me to sit down and talk about myself for on hours on end. If they did, I'm sure they'd love me, but they just don't realize how easy it is. So I tend to do the work for them. Anyone who listens to half the words I say will know most of my life story. People complain that my stories are pointless, or that my entire life is a joke without a punchline, but they're missing the point entirely. The story is the point, and all you have to do is pay attention every once in a while.

It's that easy. And by reading all this, you're well on your way. Don't think that this is just some big excuse or rationalization for my tendency to think and talk about myself so much. It's also an open invitation for everyone else to talk that much about themselves. And hey, I'll listen. Just arrange to meet me some day at the lunchroom or in the student center and talk. After a few hours, I'll listen, comprehend, understand, and maybe even love you. Unless you seem boring or ugly, in which case I'll leave at the first possible opportunity and try never to see you again.

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