I got a text from my mother recently that said: “[Your sister] went to take her SATs this morning.” There were a couple of things about this message that blew my mind. Thing number one: Despite my mother having text messaging service for the past few months, I am still always overcome with a bizarre combination of disbelief and amazement whenever I see a text message from her. My mother can text! I’m so proud. Two: My sister is really getting old. Three: If my sister is getting really old, that only means … I’m getting really old, too. Before…

So, I either have a pimple or I have cancer. Thank you, Google, for showing me the two simplest answers that you could possibly have provided me. Thank you for directing me to WebMD, Mayo Clinic and a couple of forums such as Yahoo! Answers or generic-website-for-hypochondriacs-united.com, providing me with a wealth of information and encouraging me to believe that a mysterious bump might be an ominous symbol of my impending death. But Google, and all of the websites to which you link me without fail, you never fail to remind me that it’s probably no big deal, it could…

I learned something new this week. Last Thursday was Alcohol Awareness Day. I would have never known it. If I had known about it, I would have probably had a glass of wine in its honor and acknowledged that yes, I was aware of alcohol. I find the title appropriate — Alcohol Awareness Day, as opposed to Alcohol Education Day, which often turns into: Hey, let’s tell kids alcohol is the most horrifying thing on the face of the planet, that will make you do things you would never do in your normal mental state — Like, I don’t know,…

Twelve years ago, when I was nine years old, I gave my mother an ultimatum: I had to own a spaghetti strap top. Not a tank top, but a spaghetti strap top — you know, with straps so thin that they resembled the bra I didn’t wear yet. I wouldn’t be cool if I didn’t own that shoulder-baring shirt. So, fortunately, I got one from Limited Too — which, at the time, was my haven of fashion — and I rocked it probably once a week, feeling as sexy as a Spice Girl. I continued to do this every time…

When I was in the fourth grade, I knew exactly what college spring break was like. After all, it was all over MTV, which I used as an informative mechanism on how to be cool every single day after school. Spring break took place in Miami or Cancun. The only kind of swimwear that was allowed to be worn barely existed, six-packs and belly button rings abounded and everybody loved everybody else there — that’s why they were all groping each other and dancing like that, right? This is my third college spring break and I have to say, I…

I had originally intended to write a column about Valentine’s Day, as my publication date and the loved/hated Hallmark, hormonal holiday fall only days apart. I pondered different ideas — the Hot Wheels valentines I got from boys in my first grade class, which meant nothing because they gave them to everyone; my intense relationship with Ben and Jerry; the fact that I often forget about V-day because my dad’s birthday is the day before, and I’m often scrambling to get him a card instead. I racked my brain for different ideas to put to the page, but then something…

I get it. Everyone’s cranky in mid- to late-January. The holiday season is over, so the mask of giving thanks, peace and love that so few in this population actually possess naturally, is off. The pseudo-niceties and charitable smiles are exhausting for preternaturally cranky narcissists and eternal pessimists . The Starbucks cups are no longer red, and the second the seasonal drinks disappear and the cups go back to white, the bleakest days of winter begin. So bleak, in fact, that America has forgone hope in determining whether or not spring will come and has left the answer up to…

When I was in kindergarten, I attended a school in a predominantly Christian neighborhood. We were studying the concept of less vs. more, and the teacher asked if any of us had an example of something “less” in the classroom. I raised my hand and said, “There are less Jews in the classroom.” “Okay,” the teacher said. “All of the Jews, stand up.” All three Jews, including myself, stood up in the circle. One girl, a non-Jew who was “Teacher for A Day,” remained standing, until she was kindly asked by the teacher to sit. This sort of ostracizing minimized…

I’m not racist, I’m mask-ist. If I see someone wearing a mask, I will probably run and hide, or start cowering toward the walls of a hallway, because I will have assumed that it’s their fault, not mine. They’re the ones yielding the deadly swine, and their coughs are the coughs that could strike the rest of us with eternal bed rest. I don’t stop to assume that those mask-wearing people may just be safer than I am, walking around the University broadly boasting their germ-free mentalities, not willing to inhale any viral or bacterial nonsense. But I don’t really…

Halloween, 1996. This was the only time I ever bought a packaged polyester Halloween costume. It was a 1950s girl’s poodle skirt, and I only did it because “Grease” was my favorite movie at the time. It was $20, and not only was that extremely expensive and out of my elementary school budget (on a dollar a week, a cookie at the cafeteria is a splurge), but it was uncomfortably itchy, too. On top of the scratching epidemic, everybody had the same costume. So much for self expression on the one day of the year you get to be whatever…

I would like to give a warm thank you to FOX for giving me the opportunity to live vicariously through a group of televised misfits. The “Glee” kids, while supposedly living their own hellish nightmares, stricken with teen pregnancy, isolation, cliques, sexual frustrations and petty competition, are actually living my high school dream. What I would have given to be able to break out into song at any given moment. Some may scoff at the show’s utilization of the musical number, and see it as a ploy to hook people into watching the show because everyone loves a money note…

Around last winter break, I was working out at a very popular, overpriced gym near my home in the suburbs of New York City. I wanted to use the leg press, but a man decided it was more critical that he use it as a stretching device, rather than use the mats or actual stretching devices in the, ahem, stretching area. I waited impatiently, and tapped my foot obnoxiously, and gave him my best evil gaze, in my valiant actress attempt to make him feel both guilty for interrupting my circuit in the Circuit Training Section, and stupid for using…

I recently moved off campus into an apartment and, not to throw you freshmen residing in the new Bingham out of your dormgasmic tizzy, but living in an apartment is much better than living a dorm. I mean, at least it is for me. I like having my own room, with all walls decorated with my own unorthodox choices — not one wall of my Broadway posters and one wall covered in posters of some roommate’s unique — or not so unique — interests. Or lack thereof, depending on the roommate. But to each his own. For the most part,…

I haven’t been following “American Idol” this season, but over spring break I took an hour out of my Tuesday night to play catch-up. Not only did I accurately predict who would be voted off the following eve (Scott MacIntyre, the legally blind one), but I also fell in love. With Adam Lambert. I actually remembered him from the auditions at the very beginning of the season. It was widely known that he was a professional actor from a company of the musical “Wicked.” As a theater person, this not only gave me premature hot flashes, but prompted some serious…

For those of you who, unlike me, do not use Cosmopolitan, Us Weekly and Entertainment Weekly as your semi-Bibles or as your modified Britannicas, I have a major piece of news to share with you: The next cycle of “America’s Next Top Model” is only for — wait a second, hold your breath — short people. And by short, I mean Tyra’s standard of short, which is under 5 feet 7 inches. I have been met with a ton of cracks about this, as I am only 4 feet 11 inches. So to anyone who has asked, I will not…

I’m a theater student. I know that sounds like an excuse for any irrational, hyper-emotional or negotiable behavior, but “theater student” is actually just the only phrase that you need to know about me in order to get my flow. That and “often mistaken for a seven-year-old.” I was doing a scene for a class this past fall which required a surplus of condoms as props. Rather than catch one of those uber-chic OCCT blue buses to Target only to throw down a couple of hard-earned bills from my summer job for a box of Trojans, I figured that given…