I ended up going to Los Angeles with an American Studies class here at Amherst. We pretty much drove around the city in a big white rented van and pretended that we were learning things, while really just trying to soak up some sun.

If you could travel anywhere you wanted, and money were no object, where would you go?

[After a very long pause] Mmm ... Israel. That's such a typical Jewish-girl answer.

Where are you from, Liz?

I'm from New Canaan, which is in southwestern Connecticut, about an hour outside of New York City. It's actually a town that it's a lot like Amherst … small, very quintessential New England.

If there was a TV show filmed in New Canaan, what would it be called?

Hmmm ... It would probably be called "Growing Up Preppy." Or, in the spirit of MTV: "Pimp My Volvo." Whatever it would be called, it would probably be a lot like watching the "The Stepford Wives," a large part of which was actually filmed in my town.

You look like you have a bunch of guilty pleasures you'd like to share with us. Throw me one.

I don't know … bad television? Although that's not so guilty. [Maybe] "The O.C.," "America's Next Top Model" marathon. Last year I made my Latin professor cancel every session that she was going to hold at 8 p.m. and made her have it at 9 p.m. instead just so I could watch "The O.C."

Tell me about this fascination with whipped cream I've been hearing about.

What fascination with whipped cream? People have a fascination with my supposed fascination with whipped cream.

So, any particular film you dig?

Oh, that's hard; I have a lot. Anything with Mel Brooks; "Robin Hood: Men in Tights." I have a very juvenile-boy sense of humor; I love "Austin Powers." But I also like serious movies, like "Garden State," and chick flicks. [Pause] I'm trying to think of a movie that I could watch over and over. Ah! "Pride and Prejudice," and "Bend It Like Beckham."

And your least favorite?

I hated "Pearl Harbor," hated it. I saw it a long time ago. I remember not liking it, but I don't really remember why. Josh Hartnett was cute, but he could not redeem that movie. I also hated "Titanic;" you knew how it was going to end. All during the drowning scene I really had to pee, so that made it really hard to sit through. I don't know why I just didn't go to the bathroom. I knew how it would end, but I just didn't want to leave. And then that theme song was being played everywhere. People went out and bought sheet music to play it on the piano … I think I played it in orchestra too.

You played in the orchestra? What did you play?

I played the cello. I started in third grade and quit in eighth. Imagine a little kid hauling a big-ass cello-that was me. My school had a string program, and you could choose between the viola, the violin, the cello or the bass. The cello seemed cooler than the viola and violin, and it was smaller than the bass. I couldn't have carried that thing around.

You're on the riding team. How long have you been riding?

Since I was five. The people at the barn where I used to ride wondered why I couldn't follow the directions on the board [where instructions were written], until my mom told them, "She's in kindergarten; she doesn't read yet." I was tall for my age; I always was up until fourth grade.