Active Items Added to Task List: 4--"Rat Traps", "Orchestra for Mom", "Dental Floss for Shop", "Check Pay for Tomorrow"
Inactive Items Added to Task List: 1--"Short Story #2"
Items Removed From Task List: 0
Active Items Remaining: 38

Summary of the day: I worked until about 7, finished reading the Beautiful and the Damned, ate dinner with my dad at Tamarind, dealt with some administrative tasks, and later I might go dancing with Eva and some friends.

Comments: I came up with a plan for volunteering. I want to clean up the areas next to the Amtrak tracks. They give a terrible impression of the city. For people passing through on a regular basis via rail, I imagine that the sites along the tracks discourages further exploration into the city. This is our face to the world in many respects, and it happens to be one of our worst parts. I'm personally appalled by the sites along the tracks whenever I travel on Amtrak.
Certainly I could pick up garbage, but maybe I could even remove graffiti or help demolish old structures. I'm going to write to a couple different people in the city government about my idea to get feedback and possible support.
Other than thinking about volunteering, I finished the Beautiful and the Damned. Much of the writing was brilliant. It makes me want to go back and re-read the Great Gatsby. I wasn't analyzing it (in the HTRAB sense), so I'm not going to get into it too much. The characters were compelling. It got pretty emo, but not as emo as Jude the Obscure. Fitzgerald depicted Anthony's depravity in a much less corny way than Hardy did Jude's, in my opinion. I loved the two friends--Richard and Maury. Apparently there's a movie version of the book by an Australian director that has either been released recently or will be released soon. I'd be curious to see it, and specifically to see who plays Gloria.

Plan for tomorrow: At 1 I have my class, which goes until 3:30. I'll probably wake up late and spend the morning preparing for that. At 6:30 we're going to Tiffin for Mother's Day. Between events, I'll probably help plan food for next week and maybe read. Any extra time I have at the end of the day I'll use to compose correspondences about my volunteering idea.