Not feeling upset right now makes me awfully suspicious. I feel like maybe I finally caffeinated myself enough to numb everything out, but there must be some sort of tension boiling beneath the surface. There’s got to be.

For the past week, I’ve been fixing up my life. About two weeks ago, I dropped off the face of the earth, huddled up in my Mather single for five straight days, and ignored all obligations — work, class, friends, everything. You could say that I finally crashed and burned as expected. Since then, I’ve been reborn not unlike a phoenix, was kicked out of a club bearing the same name, and have attempted to undo the damage of my depression-induced sloth. I have also drank and slept a lot.

So far, my strategy of being too busy to mope is working. I write to-do lists I never check off. I owe IvyGate a blog entry, the Crimson a short article, and H-Bomb a book proposal. I have two papers due in less than a week. I am supposed to launch two PR campaigns by year’s end. Who has time to worry? I don’t have time for makeup.

I have also been self-medicating with coffee, boys, and shopping. I never drank so much coffee in my life. I started this year. The past week has brought seven cups of joe, two and a half hookups, and $650 in shopping expenses. I don’t know if I really needed any of the preceding to stay sane. Was it necessary to rack up hundreds in charges or to artificially induce a Ritalin-high? Would I be any worse off if I didn’t? And in order to self-medicate, don’t I need to be sick? Right now, I’m neither sad nor happy so I find myself with a perplexing problem — I don’t know if I actually need a cure.

But I shouldn’t speak too soon. After all, the weekend is here and I am fully prepared for late week depression. Over dinner Tuesday night, I told my sophomore adviser (coincidentally, a psychiatrist at Massachusetts General Hospital) that I go through ups and downs during the week. From Monday through Thursday, I am too busy to be sad. But come Thursday evening, the drinking begins and my mood takes a dip. Inevitably, I wake up a bit sadder for each of the next three mornings.

I am trying to finish all my work so I can go to New York next week. Ideally, I take off Sunday evening. I don’t care what it takes, I don’t care if I spend Thanksgiving alone, I need to get out of here.

And before someone beats me to the punch, I acknowledge that I have given into blogging before my self-declared hiatus ends. I can’t help it. I crave it like a drug. There’s a constant hunger to be understood, and I’m convinced that I can’t find that understanding at Harvard. I’ve been feeling disconnected lately and I spent last night missing writing, the only thing that has ever made me feel close to being understood. Lately, it has kept me functioning even as my sanity has unraveled. How do I turn my back on something like that?

Dinner now with Vix. Long overdue. Then Happy Hour with my frosh and HN. This weekend has possibilities I don’t want to face.

I repeat: this is not an update.

This is, however, a desperate cry for assistance. Specifically, for Thanksgiving plans. I refuse to make a six-hour trek back to California. I will probably have a nervous breakdown if I stay cooped up in Cambridge. Ideal destination? New York. Problem? Accomodations.

If money were not an issue, I’d check into the Ritz and call it a weekend. Unfortunately, money, like my multiple STDs, is a huge issue (kidding, it’s just a minor rash). So therefore, I’m looking for a place to stay. I’m petite, compact, low-maintenance — at least as a guest. If you have a futon, awesome. If you have a free 62 by 15-inch space, that works too. In conclusion, anything that gets me a couple days in the city will do and I will repay you in meals/eternal gratitude/sex of the intellectual sort. Sketchy men need not apply. Non-penis owners, penis owners with references, and friends of either should email me.

Real blogging (now featuring self-censorship!) will begin again post-Game or post-Thanksgiving. Unless I pick up a new stalker, in which case my attention-whoring, pity-mongering ass will officially go into hiding much to the relief of my disgusted but morbidly curious critics.

Peace.

I quit blogging. At least for the week. Maybe permanently if my quality of life skyrockets as a result of neglecting this website.

I helped plan an event this afternoon and was approached by the Crimson’s Roving Reporter who asked somewhat facetiously, “Do you think your sex blog will reflect badly on the organization?” I said that I’m involved in plenty of campus groups and it’s never been a problem before so it shouldn’t even be a consideration. But after tonight, I’m rethinking my response to that question. I don’t want this website to taint the groups or people or causes I hold dear. Already, I feel like I am incapable of normal social interaction and I joke that I’ll never work in finance now, but neither should be the case. So before it comes to that, maybe I should just stop.

This has probably been one of the most shitty sober nights I’ve had. Around 1am, the blockmates and I decided that we might as well give Mt. Auburn a go. By 3am, I called it quits. Currently, my right ring finger is a raw pink after being stepped on so hard that the polish came off. My eyes are recovering from vodka spilt on my face. And my pride? Well, I had the pleasure of being kicked out of a club tonight. Really.

At the bar, I requested the drink I always get (”orange juice on the rocks”) and was asked politely to leave instead. “Um, leave the club?” I asked. “Are you Lena Chen?” he responded. I answered in the affirmative and he told me (apologetically) that I had to go.

“It’s fine,” I said. But really, it wasn’t fine at all. It’s not like getting banned from a club is the end of the world. Hardly. But I think it’s indicative of the greater issue at hand: my life as I knew it is more or less over at this point.

These guys tonight determined that my presence was unwelcome because I might blog about their party in the morning. But there are people who do want me at their party precisely because I might blog about them, and those people are just as bad.

I go through entire parties without ever introducing myself because I’m passed along from one group to another — no introduction required — as the “sex blogger,” this evening’s entertainment. I question the motives of people who are overly friendly upon first meeting. I often find out mid-conversation that all some people are really interested in is my sex life. No one ever talks to me about my ambitions anymore. No one ever asks my concentration.

When I go out, I leave my blog at home. On my laptop. It is okay to bring it up during a conversation. It is not okay to leave that conversation knowing more about my website than about my day-to-day life. That’s what really pisses me off. People don’t seem to care beyond sex — who wants to hear about my sociology courses or interest in publishing?

I didn’t leave Mather for almost five days last weekend. The outside world is too vast to face. I say things in lecture and section and I wonder if people discount my contribution because I’m “that girl.” I don’t meet new people anymore. My reputation precedes me at Harvard so I’ll wait to make new friends after I graduate. I shy away from big parties where I’m apt to run into several people who want to discuss the blog. I am scared of walking alone at night. This never used to be the case, but I also never had stalkers. I get approached by strange men too often for comfort.

While I’m at it, I get to put up with contradictory criticism. Since I write a blog called “Sex and the Ivy,” I clearly have an obligation to know everything about sex, have sex all the time, and write about it as often as possible. Because I take on provocative subjects, I’m obviously asking for celebrity so I have no one to blame but myself when faced with its pitfalls. Right. I don’t know about you, but I don’t think infamy is an expected outcome for most things in life. I’ve been blogging since I was 15. I had no reason to believe that Sex and the Ivy was going to seriously impact my life.

I’m not a website. I’m a person. Everyone seems to forget that. Maybe that’s why I’m hooked on office hours. Professors and TFs are the only ones who listen to my goals. Maybe that’s why I haven’t made any new female friends or friends in general. I approach new acquaintances with distrust. Maybe that’s why I never answer calls from guys who express interest in my blog. Whatever they think of me, it can’t possibly be accurate.

Being blacklisted has really been the highlight of my year. I’m not embarassed; I’m pissed. I’m pissed because those guys, like much of this campus, can’t see past Elle. I’m just one totally expendable guest to them, and to tons of other people, I’m weeknight procrastination material. But Lena is who I really am and she also happens to be a girl no one is actually interested in knowing, who people find it easy to criticize and dismiss. No single person’s behavior really matters, but taken as a whole, it’s hard to stomach the way I’m treated.

Tonight’s completed the ultimate metaphor. Whether or not I’m on the guest list, Harvard is one big party that I don’t belong at.

Class or ass? Ah, the typical Wednesday night/Thursday morning dilemma.

It is pushing 1 a.m. and I really need to get started on this paper. Unfortunately, my motivation amounts to zilch, and I have no study buddies in sight. Allie and Maggie are in bed, Sue is bedridden (ill), and Terra is somewhere having fun as a pseudo-21-year-old. I, on the other hand, can’t seem to concentrate because my sexual frustration has reached a boiling point.

I’ve gone through the phonebook … and the Facebook. Both have failed me (along with my text messaging plan). If it weren’t for the fact that too many TFs are on my address book, I’d send along a form letter via mail merge. This boy seemed to get my dilemma, so I sent him a short but sweet response in the vein of “Facebook me. Screw me. Thanks.” He’s yet to respond — can’t imagine why. [Update: he's responded and tragically, is a non-Harvardian who lacks swipe access to my building and therefore, my cunt.]

Let’s face it: I’m probably not getting ass tonight (or tomorrow or the next day), and this paper just isn’t going to write itself.

I’m calling it quits and heading to Lamont.

UPDATE 1:03 p.m. — SENATE IS TIED & RUMSFELD RESIGNS

Election coverage has kept me up until 4:11 a.m., but for the first time in years, I’m going to bed pleased. I may be a Crimsonette at heart, but today, it’s all about the blue.

News from home (that is, Los Angeles): Britney Spears files for divorce from K-Fed … and then a sex tape emerges. Click here for the blowjob footage. Not in lecture, please.

And check out my new favorite PostSecret submission. How very Closer-esque. For the recrod, I used to tell guys my name was Susie.