Maybe this will make up for effing photobucket stopping halfway through my upload yesterday so I don't get to update about the concert still. >:(

( oh hey )

"I bargain-hunt like I'm a cheetah and bargains are my gazelle meals."

On Saturday I went on my first real thrift store shopping trip. There's this big, huge Value Village near my house and I know I've been in it before but that might have been to drop stuff off...I don't really remember, it was a few years ago. But the other day I went for real to look for things 'cause they were having a holiday special and everything was 50% off. I learned that I really like thrift stores and that I might want to live in one. But not as much as I want to live in Target.
Also I felt like I was cheating on Tommy by going by myself because he was supposed to take me for my first thrift store shopping since he's a veteran at it. :P
I ended up getting a new-looking pair of flats from Target, something I'll use as a make-up bag, a sweet early-90's-looking kid's wallet, and a set of four teeny tiny beer-mug shaped shot glasses that are the cutest things ever all for $7.01. I'm in love.
Also I spent forever looking through the books but didn't find anything I wanted until I got to the kids' section, haha. Then I saw a bunch of different Animorphs books. omg. They were my favorite things circa 1999/4th grade. I actually contemplated buying them and then re-donating them when I was finished since I don't really need them sitting around. Then I remembered there are these establishments called "libraries" that will let me do that for free. So that's my new mission for the rest of the summer.

Update about the rest of my weekend probably tomorrow when I can upload pictures at work. Dial-up at home is a sad, sad thing.

Also, because facebook now lets you have 200 pictures to an album instead of just 60, I spent like 5 hours reorganizing and combining mine yesterday. I cut my albums from 34 down to 20. You don't have to tell me that was a waste of time and I'm crazy...I know.

Still reading even more tfln and Shakespeare, but only because it's cloudy out so I'm not outside. And I'm babysitting the crazies while my mom is out so I have to stay in anyway.

The summer sun is like a warm, cozy light-blanket. I want to lie in it all day. I'm sort of almost golden right now and loving it. The breeze is nice, too.

Sometimes I love my job. Times like when Jackie and I watch online movies or watch Ellen's commencement speech to Tulane University when the movies aren't good enough quality. And then she takes a nap and I get on the internet all day because the phones are slow and I get to wait to call kids till next week (don't judge us, they weren't ready for driving kids or anything; this stack was all no licenses or not enough hours anyway). And Mr Bell lets everyone have off yesterday and today for Independence Day, but really yesterday only because he's a greedy, stingy old man and won't have to pay us that way. It's fun.

I'm not fit to care for psychiatric patients. It's too bad my aunt Debbie's crazy too so I have to babysit both of them, instead of her taking care of my grandma.

I accidentally read tfln for like six hours last night. I made it through 100 pages...I wish I was kidding about that.
I'm shocked I didn't dream about drinking and texting. Although I did dream a little about gettin' it on in one scene. But most of my dream last night was kind of epic. It was the first day of school and all my classes were kind of weird, like the one where we looked at honeycombs, but the buildings were really fancy and new—not like hightechmodernindustrialnew, just newly built but decorated with lots of orangey tones and made to look...like some kind of set I can't describe. I liked it, though. And then there were people in crazy giant 80s hair wigs and then this other character who was probably my love interest and I had to fight something supernatural that I'm not sure about but may have been taking over the school. I think I got a sort of JDatE vibe but not really at all. I should probably write a shitty "saga" about it and make millions. Don't worry, though. I won't and no one sparkled or was a stalker.

I also read Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors last night in an hour and a half, maaayyybe two hours because of this site and it's greatness. I wonder why that didn't make it into the dream.

I need a shower.

Kathryn picked me up from work on Wednesday night in the middle of a freaking monsoon! We went up to Caitlin's house and watched Wipeout and So You Think You Can Dance and played with her cats and spent the night. :) Bright and early Thursday morning we left and started the like six-hour trek through boring Pennsylvania. The western part we were driving through is full of nothing! A few towns and townships, and "Jesus Country" haha and lots of mountains. I loved the mountains, though, and they were making fun of me for taking so many pictures of them. Then through a little bit of New York, and finally we made it to the border. The Canadian border patrol guy was so friendly and just asked, "Where are you from?" "Where are you going?" and "For what?" and let us right on through, no ID and passport checks or anything. That evening we made our first stop at Niagara Falls in Toronto and the falls are gorgeous. Really, they're so so so impressive and can't be described. Friday morning we went to the Ontario Science Centre. It was lots of stuff for little kids, but it was still cute and we had fun. Saturday we went to Kensington Market and then stumbled upon Woofstock which was the best thing ever. teehee A jillion dogowners were there with their puppies and it was the cutest ever and we just walked around going "look at that one!" forever. Then we went to the Hockey Hall of Fame, the original reason Kathryn came up with for the trip. It was really cool to see everything in the showcases and all the tons of Ovechkin stuff, haha. We liked the trophy room and doing the interactive stuff. I actually got one goal (though I don't know how) and Kathryn stopped 4 out of 5 pucks I think as the goalie. Then we went to Harbourfront Centre and marveled over the clear, clean water that we're not used to in our harbors, haha. And saw Cirque du Soleil street performers because we apparently came during a festival. Later that night we went to the park across the street from our hotel and (I) played on the playground. :D On Sunday we went to Riverdale Farm and saw all the animals and petted cute, fuzzy sheep. I liked the farm a lot, it was adorable and had wildflowers and gardens and a mini waterfall AND it was the only free thing we did. Now on Saturday night while we were back at the hotel room watching tv before bed we came across ballhockey and were shocked they would be airing this as a real thing and that the players were intense and got in an actual fight (yeah Oshawa Bruins!). We started looking stuff up and found out that there was going to be a triple header near where we were staying Sunday night. ahahaha So we went and it was SO awkward because we were three teen/20 girls who are not family members in the audience. Fantastic. Except that I accidentally was getting really into it. :P
Monday morning we drove home and stopped at Matt's house to give him souvenirs since he brought us all things from Italy after winter.
We also made some drive-by stops along the way to see the castle, Casa Loma, and the Little Glenn statue and City Hall and other things. And the Distillery District which I'm still not convinced exists.

Go see my pictures! Fbook #1 Fbook #2

My only complaint about Toronto was that it costs so much to go anywhere and to park! I can let you get away without all free public parking all over the place, but to charge as much as they did! Ugh. And museums are expensive so we didn't even go to the ROM. :( I'm sad and I want to go back sometime and do things we didn't get to on this trip. But for now I want to go take advantage of D.C. and our lovely free Smithsonian museums for a while.

OH! I forgot to tell you about our awesome playlist of Canadian themed songs to get us pumped. Let's just say that I'm a new huge fan of The Arrogant Worms and of having Canada in My Pocket. ♥

After writing the other day I got inspired to try and clean up around the house some while I was still there alone. I recycled a big stack of old school papers that were sitting around in a drawer. And then I went through some piles of old clothes we had lying around and sorted them so we can throw away the ones in bad shape and wash the others to try to sell them at a yard sale my mom's wanted to have for years. It felt good to be accomplishing something but then I was done with that and stuck because I can't take any more steps...our washer at home is 20 or 30 years old and tiny so barely anything fits in a load and we have to hook it up to the kitchen sink, so we always wash clothes at my grandma's house. And I wanted to clean up more other stuff but before doing anything you have to make a place for it somewhere and clean that place up first. Gah! But oh well. At least I got it started.

Hey, I never wrote about my trip! I'll do that next.

Some more life-fucking.

2. Eff this. Why? Why do I let myself ease up and enjoy some moments even though I know I shouldn't? I know it sounds cliche and emo and whiny, and a little bit I want to shoot myself for saying so, but for real I need to build up a wall and fucking keep it there for once. Because when I start to let my guard down I just end up pissed and disappointed. You think I'm talking about my love life, don't you? Nope. My parents are fucking bitches. You know what, I'm not even really talking about my mom right now, even though the aforesaid should definitely be applied to her. My dad is fucking white trash and I hate him and this is ridiculous. Hee's happy to see me when I come home (if I even see him, that is—I didn't for the first week and a half I was home from college since I was with my mom and sister at our grandma's most of the time). But anyway, yes, he seems happy and wants to hear a few stories and how I did in classes, I guess. But then he goes back to being the fucking bum that he is. He goes outside and listens to country music that he's BLASTING in the backyard on the deck. For HOURS and hours. I'm talking from the minute he gets home from work until late late ay night when he comes inside and goes to bed. And drinks beer for all those hours and is sometimes wobbling on his way back in. How can you do that?! I mean, I don't blame him for not wanting to sit in our house because it's all junky and full of piles of old crap we need to get rid of...but to just sit outside and drink and smoke and blast his coumtry music? Why not quit smoking and gambling away your paychecks and start being a decent person so maybe my mom could recover from being a heinous bitch since you drove her crazy, and we might be motivated to get stuff done around here and clean up.
I'm not going to get over this. I'm going to keep resenting you for this. For not being able to get your kids braces; for not even making an effort to help pay for college; for not being able to pay bills for months at a time, almost getting the house taken away at least recently, I don't know how close in the past; for making me be shocked and surprised when you do something that might seem a given for a normal parent, like offering to pay for my class ring and giving me a hundred bucks spending money for my friends' and my New York trip last winter. Things like this should not appen.

What spurred this entry? I was here at home last Sunday after I got home from the beach with Tommy and Jason and assorted other friends of theirs, and when I came in my dad and I talked for a while and then watched Merlin together (and it's awesome and I'm a huge dork :P ). A few days ago I went out back and talked to him and his friend Mike who was over about my Canada trip and about my school semester. They were laughing and joking and it was fun times. When I was telling them my grades (A's and B's in bio classes and C's in chem) I mentioned again how last year I failed orgo 1 but got an A when I retook it the next time with a better professor, but then dropped back to a C this time. And we're laughing about that and Mike said something like, "Chemistry is beyond us" or "beyond our scope" or something like that referring to him and my dad, and my reply was, "Well mine too, clearly." That got a bigger laugh than I'd expected and they were all "Ohh! She's one of us!" and telling me to sit down and grab a beer and everything and it was really funny and cute.
So here I was all thiniking that it's not so bad, and he's being nice, and ...I dunno, just no anger. But at the same time, in the back of my head, my conscience was telling me, "No. Don't. Don't start thinking that way because you'll just be disappointed again and be mad at yourself."
Tonight Jason dropped me off at around 11 PM after the baseball game tonight and of course the music coming from the backyard is crazy loud. I went to my room, shut the door, and put on my own music to drown it out and at...well I don't remember what time but probably like midnight...I hear banging on the front door and I was freaked the fuck out once I realized that it was real and I wasn't making it up and it was at our door. But buy the time I got up and turned my computer speakers down and was gonna go peek out, my dad had turned his stereo down outside and I could hear police radio sounds. I went to the front door and saw flashing lights. After a couple minutes the radio came back on but was not as loud and they were driving away. My dad came in a little while later, super drunk, and said something about a $500 fine. I asked if it was just a warning or if he was for sure getting the fine but I don't remember what he said. Then he went to his room and I thought he was safely in for the night. I thought wrong. At fucking 12:39 AM he comes back out of the room, into my doorway, and is all, "fuck them people" and "I don't care" and "I'm mad, and that's why I'm going back out" and "you got $500? Come out and have a beer, we'll split it 250 and 250" et cetera et cetera. sdfhw;hfsfhno[seun[wehfn[owirsfdskjhfsakhdfsdjfhs So of course I'm telling him, you know, it's 12:40 and he shouldn't go back out, and people are trying to sleep and IT'S 12:40, and well at least put it lower (the "fuck them people" parts were of course around this time). So now here it is, 2:49 AM and the music is still playing. He's probably asleep out there by now, though...I'm not sure.
And I knowwww. I know. This isn't like he's being mean to me or anything direct like that at all. In fact I have no part in it and it's really an anomally I'm even here right now and not at my grandma's. But... just... he's just such a shitty person. It just triggered this whole rant and everything I'm feeling right now. Gahhhh I can't stand it. It's not fair. I don't want to put up with this. Or to have our poor neighbors have to listen to that crap all the damn time. Ugh.
Alright I'm done. I'm going to sleep now. I can't believe I wrote so much.

Fuuuuck my life right now.

1. I'm really over my abdomen right now. Thursday night I was up late on the computer, sitting at my grandma's kitchen table, nd at around 2:30 or so my back started hurting. It was like my spine and a little to the left, and it felt like I just needed to stretch and crack it or something. But then starting at near 3 when I was putting away the computer and going to sleep downstairs on the couch, holy fuck my insides felt like they were ripping apart. I was basically doing acrobatics tossing and turning on the couch and couldn't find a single position where the pain eased up—I mean at least I can usually eventually find some way to lie down for cramps, but nothing could be done here. I'm pretty sure I did manage to sleep a little bit somewhere in the middle of this, but was definitely up for most of the three hours from then until 6, when I finally could take any more writhing, and wimpering, and demanding that the waves of nausea either cut it out or force something out so I'd feel better, and debating on how long I should wait before making my mom drive me to the hospita,l and whether I should facebook my cousin Danny to ask him what it felt like when he had appendicitis some years back. So finally around 6 I went back upstairs and turned my computer back on to ask webmd what in the hell was going on with me. Turns out your appendix is on the right side so that was out, but I found out I have diverticulitis. I say "have" and not "had" because even though the pain eventually got duller and I slept through the rest of that night, I've still been really uncomfortable since. If I've been sitting for a while I'm all hunched over for the first few minutes after I get up until I can walk okay. And I haven't really had much of an appetite but I've made myself eat some anyway.
AND so this made me feel kind of crappy on my like...eight or nine hour date with Jason today, haha. We went to Baltimore and walked around the harbor and places for a while, and then met up with his friends to go to an O's vs. Nats game. I had fun. :)

3. I'm not used to this keyboard at home because I've only stayed on my laptop at my grandma's, so I keep making typos and this is taking me forever to write.

I'm going to Canada on Thursday!!!!
My passport just came in the mail today. I saw a biggish brown official-looking envelope and got excited, and then the return address verified my hopes. Then I opened it and all my excitement was shattered because it was my birth certificate, the extra photo, and the photocopies of things I had to send in for them to verify my identity. And a paper saying my passport card would be sent in a separate mailing. My response: you've got to be fucking kidding me. BUTTTT then I looked at the rest of the mail and in a sneaky, ordinary-looking, plain white envelope was my passport card! Yay!!!!

Tomorrow/Wed I need to focus on packing and making sure I don't have anything to do here.

I'm so excited.

Some very mixed feelings about being home for the summer:

1. OHMYGOD I HATE THIS LET ME GO BACK TO COLLEGE.
I really just can't stand being at home. Not that I even am home... My mom, sister, and I have been staying over at my grandma's house lately because she's gotten to the point where she can't live alone anymore (or has been there a while). It's really miserable and awful over here. She's just so mean and nasty to all my aunts & my mom when they come over to help. Every time you try to say something helpful, like to go help wash her hands or when they're washing her clothes and sheets and stuff, all she does is yell and shout about how this is her house and everyone thinks she's ugly and stupid and all her friends are dead and that we're trying to kill her. You can only be patient for so long. It's five or ten minutes after you walk in the door before you cut the being super nice act and just go about your business trying to ignore her because there's no way to reason with her or calm her down until she forgets and is on to complaining about the next thing. It's really sad and not good for anyone's health or well-being to be stuck here all day.
So basically, half my belongings are at my real house sitting in the utility room still packed up because there's no space to put them anywhere and I've only even been in my house a few times. (I went about a week and a half being home from college before I even saw my dad.) And the other half are here in grandma's basement.

2. MMMMM, SUMMER!
I get to escape when I go to work...and I'm now working longer hours for the summer and gettin' paid, bitches...and I watch tv and movies online and facebook after my real work is done.
Plus on afternoons I'm not working I go sit in our glorious sun and soak in its rays. Ughhh the nice, hot, sunny days have been so wonderful to me. Then a couple days of rain snuck in and ruined all my fun, but they've ended. :D Is "snuck" really not a word? Because I'm going to use it anyway, but thanks Firefox.
And I've done a few fun things like going to a baseball game and partying. You'll hear more about these things soon...whenever I root through my stuff to find my flash drive and upload pictures at work since I can't bear to do it on the dial-up here. :\ And it's dinner time now anyway.
Later kids ♥

Stole this from Kathryn (garywilliams)

1) write your username.
2) write the name of two of your favorite bands/artists.
3) write "i ♥ ______". this is to see how you write hearts.
4) write the name of your all-time favorite person.
5) write the name of a recently favored person.
6) tag six people to do this.

( see my handwriting )

Because I'm bored, a survey stolen from raspberryfur

( boring things about me )

I haven't watched late night television in so long. :( I always forget at school and something else like that awful Chelsea Lately is usually on anyway. But I've been watching Jay Leno's last episodes on the Tonight Show this past week and can't wait to see it tonight. It seems like not that long ago he was announcing that he'd be stopping and Conan would be taking over, it's weird that it's happening already. I don't know if I can handle watching three hours of late night with Jay moving up to 10, though, haha. But I'm so excited for Conan to be moving up! Now next year I can watch him AND Craig Ferguson—I'm glad Susie likes to watch Craig so I know I won't forget to turn them on next year when we room together.
I'm also glad we got a lucky break and during a storm ...this might have been during the summer actually...anyway, the lightning blew out a bunch of tv's in my neighborhood, including ours I think. But all we had to do was go buy a new fuse at the store for really cheap, and more than one came in the pack. Then my dad picked up some person from the neighborhood's tv and brought it home so we could put a new fuse in that one and we kept it as a new spare tv. This might make us bad people for not returning it and being good samaritans, but oh well. Now I have a tv to bring to the apartment and we won't be stuck with just one tv for the four of us. And I can actually watch things I want to and not have people tell me I can't and that the things I like are crap. Hooray. I'm also trying to catch up on a bunch of shows online while I'm at work this summer. It's like I have a never-ending list of things to watch, haha.

Wow I need more than 15 icons.

How are you guyssss?

So in lieu of writing a real entry, I spent a ridiculous number of hours tonight updating my 101 list over at lettucewalkon. I honestly have no idea how it is 4:39 in the morning right now. But no matter. It's done and I'm completely updated with this and I feel great. As of right now I have 16 things officially completed and others in the works.

( Read more... )

Oh, and the numbers of completed ones are links to entries on that other journal. Feel free to comment over there or whatever if you want.
Okay. Sleepy time.

OH SHIT YOU GUYS I'm finished with my sophomore year of college! Ahhhhhhhhhhh! I'm halfway through! This is terrifying. The second year went by so much faster than the first. This semester was okay...

In my Ecology class I'm getting a B+ and I'm actually really annoyed at this because I had a 90.09 going into the final, but all of a sudden he decided to change the format of the test and gave us 'all of the above' AND 'none of the above' on the mc part AND didn't include his matching section. So I was all second-guessing myself the whole time and got an 80 on the final. Blown. I was SO close. Also, this is my first non-A in a bio class. :( I was so proud until now. But still, Forseth was a really good lecturer. He always snuck in little jokes and his loud, booming voice was oddly soothing. But discussion for this class was fucking miserable. The TA was so timid and whenever there were questions she just turned them into open-ended questions to the rest of the class and asked what we thought. That's what we're fucking asking you for! She also designed the whole class to basically rip the articles we read to shreds. We have to summarize one every week and bring up points and questions, and it just turned into belittling everything about them each time because we all had to say something for discussion points, so why not give her what she wants. It was obnoxious. I mean there's always something of some value you can take out of experiments, you know? Ugh.
In Conservation I'm getting an A. The class was...not quite a "joke" but really fucking easy (minus the fact that everyone failed the first test because he brought out tarded details, but then curved it like crazy for us). But it was a lot of common sense things and looking at cute pictures of animals. Oh, and I learned Hardy-Weinberg Equilibrium for about the sixth of seventh time in my life, haha. But our teacher Leo was the cutest little nerdy guy. And he had an adorable son that came in one time and that he showed pictures of one time in a presentation.
Then there was also an optional Cons Lab that was FUCKING WONDERFUL. It was so great, just once a week for a few hours we got guest speakers or went on field trips to the Zoo and Defenders of Wildlife and Patuxent Wildlife Research Center and restored wetlands and omg fun places to hear experts talk about their work. Their lives for me? Please?
My Animal Communication class was supposed to be one of my favorites, but I didn't enjoy it very much. Or at all. The first half of the semester it was all just physics because we had to cover things like sound and light production and propagation and reception and all that jazz. So that was awful. Then the second half picked up and was more about motivation behind communication and game theory and stuff, but we also had a time-consuming group project where we had to analyze a shit-ton of recordings. I mean it was interesting, and my group did chickadees and titmice, but a lot of work. :\ Also, this teacher teaches Animal Behavior but after this class I didn't really want to take it anymore. But thyen I heard from a couple girls in my class who had him for it before and they said he's a lot more comfortable teaching that one, that he's better at it, and that they really enjoyed it. So maybe. I don't know. But one of my friends is taking it next semester so I can always ask him about it all semester long, haha.
Organic Chemistry II & lab. What can I say? It was hell, naturally. Except for when I almost got a B. But then I screwed up on the third exam so I'm stuck with like an average C. Ah, well. And DeShong really was good at teaching and I feel like I actually learned a lot, it's just that I can't do chemistry, lol. But orgo lab is never okay. That's just always, always hell. Oh shit I'm done with orgo forever! Cue my neverending glee! I'm going to miss the people, though. Oh and crap, I still have gen chem 2. :(

And that's it! I took ALL SCIENCE classes and no outside electives. I was crazy. But I got a 3.2 overall. So that's good. Fuck, I wish I had gotten that ecology A. :( Alright, I'm stopping. I know my grades are good. So close, though!

Hot damn you all write a lot. Or maybe not. Maybe it's just overwhelming to read old flist pages when I haven't been on LJ in a month or two. So what important things have gone on in your lives? I want to know.

My life is pretty boring. No, I take that back. I'm having fun. And I'm incredibly stressed. So not boring at all.

Here's the thing, though. I have no time for a real update with stories and troubles right now. Today was our last day of classes for the semester, then we have "study day" (please, UMD, just give us a week, we need it so bad), and then start FINALS! :'( Ah fuck, guys. I'm not ready for finals. Or to be halfway through college. This is scary stuff we're talking about here.

But I feel like I accomplished things today and yesterday, so I'm rewarding myself with distractions and doing this survey( : )

I can't wait for summer and relaxing and working more hours and catching up on tv and reading and updating this thing. I'm sorry all my entries are the same promises.

Hi everybody. I know, do you even remember me?! School is insanely busy with group projects and labs and exams and SO MANY papers. Plus work is not as relaxing and full of time as it used to be. Everything's ridiculously hectic-feeling, even if it is only me feeling like I have a million things to do all at once. I wish I actually updated.

But I hope you all are having good Springs/break/holidays! I went to my aunt's house and got to see a lot of family yesterday, it was fun.

But now there really is nothing left. The end of the semester is going to get here way sooner than I want it to. Yikes. But I'll still be working this summer, unless I get this really sweet internship I applied for. I might die of happiness. Not that it's anything really exciting like real field work, but it's still looking at satellite images and tracking Mongolian gazelles based on vegetation cover. Butttt, there's only one position. :( My resume's so good, though! And it would be so interesting! I want. :(

I have lots of things to tell you. Like housing news and classes news and personal news. And mission 101 news. :) I just need to find more time to do it. Maybe I can this weekend while my roommate and I have our laundry party, haha! Until then, I did this survey while I sat here at my computer feeling terrible and worrying about having food poisoning. I think I'm feeling better now, though. Guh. :\

My sentences are sounding so choppy. I need to fix this.

( Read more... )

And, it's now officially time to be productive for the night. Hoorah.

My life really needs to slow down for a second. Although actually I thought it had been longer since I made an update than it really has been.

Classes this semester are so-so. I'm not doing terribly, but I'm also not really doing well. There's just so much reading to do all the time. And so many article summaries. But making lists of everything I need to do is still keeping me sane, as always. Also I think I've become obsessed with calendars. I don't know. I probably should let go and relax more often, but I can't.
I'm not saying I haven't been having fun, though! Trust me, I have. I still do fun things with the roommates and go party with everybody on weekends, etc. It's great. There's just a lot on my mind all the time.

We're on Spring Break right now, but we only get one week and it's half gone already. :( And I haven't done ANY work. I did go to Hershey, PA with Kathryn and Caitlin over the weekend. :D Pictures later from my sweet new camera.
Oh yeah, I dropped my old camera and broke it and lost a bunch of pictures because I was using internal memory and not a card, and it doesn't even turn on anymore. :'( I still want to waste a bunch of money to have it repaired if they can be salvaged, but Ritz Camera apparently filed for bankruptcy and wasn't accepting cameras for repair when I checked a couple weeks ago. ...I wonder if they're afloat yet or if I can send it in to Nikon even though I don't think I got a warranty and it's three years old.

Over the next three and a half days I need to:
-get a helluva lot of research done for my animal communication group project
-figure out a chem lab report and post-lab questions
-read and summarize a completely useless article that teaches me nothing about ecology
-study the shit out of organic chemistry and actually retain it
-finish 3 delegate scholarship applications
--including an essay on how I would change state government
-request a transcript from my high school, where I haven't been for two years
-get a passport
-get a guaranty of lease form notarized and figure out where my friends and I are living next year
-various other small things that could be done later but will only screw me if I procrastinate
-probably figure out that camera nonsense

On the plus side, all of those scholarship apps are already half-done and I got my college transcripts a couple weeks ago. And I think I've perfected my resume.

I hope you all are well! I'll try catching up on entries soon. ♥

P.S. Fuck facebook for changing again into something uglier and even more disorganized and cluttered-looking.

Oh shit, you guys. I was just about to update about classes this semester but I realized I never did at the end of Fall. So I'll do that first. And then I probably won't update about the past two weeks yet because I really have to do actual work and studying after this.


In Genetics I got a guaranteed A with my 3 midterms and everything else without dropping any of the lowest grades, and Patty Shields is such an awesome teacher that you're allowed to sign off and accept whatever grade you got if you don't want to take the final. Hell yes. So then I only had 4 finals to take instead of 5. I already miss helping Dan and Landon with the crossword and sitting with Matt in the back of discussion trying to hide our shaking with laughter and silent looks whenever Harley or this one girl in the class said something.
Biometrics was really easy (easier than the second midterm) and I got 100% on the final! Plus Chris Hakenkamp is another great teacher and she replaces your lowest exam grade by double-counting the final if you did better on it. So that got me an A+ despite my completely motherfucking useless group members for our research project fiasco that somehow (don't ask me how) turned out decently.
In Chemistry (Orgo 1) I had no idea how I did on the final, but with the curve and my good grades on the midterms I got an A in that too! But now I'm afraid Fred Khachik was such an easy teacher and gave easier exams that I've been spoiled, so I'm scared for Orgo 2.
In History of Britain (1465-1714) I got a B+ which I'm very happy with. Both exams were straight IDs and were so intimidating, but I did semi-decently on the midterm and apparently well on the final. I think I did really well on the two papers too (A- on the first, never got the second back). Also, my teacher's name was Baron and I thought that was fantastic for a history teacher. She also told us that she got married using some original version of a bible but I can't remember which year it was because I don't have my notes here anymore. And that her favorite punk band is this British band New Model Army...named for the New Model Army under Oliver Cromwell (who was a fucking beast, by the way) and junk.
And Archaeology was just a joke and I got an A. Fracchia told us it would be the same length as the midterms and easier than the last one, and he wasn't lying. That class was seriously one of the best decisions I've made. It was so interesting and fun, and we hardly had to study except on the night before exams. I'm glad I don't have to go to that discussion where it's painfully silent and only like five of us answer questions. I'm not glad, however, to be rid of Stephen Brighton as a professor. He was amazing! He liked to make little jokes and say that skulls found embedded in walls were sexy and that you shouldn't take your sword out at the dinner table. And wear loungecoat blazer things that made us imagine him sitting in a giant chair next to a fireplace, holding a glass of brandy, smoking a pipe, and welcoming us to the classroom. But perhaps most important is that I didn't discover until the minute I left the room after taking the final that HE HAS THE TATTOO I WANT IN THE PLACE I WANT. Not kidding. Caitlin told me she saw that he had a Celtic knot on his wrist (which I've been thinking about for I don't even know how long) when he reached to take her paper. Ohmygod, how does he know?

So yeah, that's my last semester in a nutshell. I think it's strange that it was my most successful yet (3.812 GPA) but it's the one where I was working part-time every other day and it seemed like I was always doing something or going somewhere. But hey, I'm not complaining.

My (extended) birthday was really fun this year. Seriously, though, it's weird to think that I'm 20. Not only am I not a child anymore, but I'm not even a teenager anymore. It's a scary thought. I'm growing up. Am I getting more mature? I still feel like I have fun and do things like a kid. Maybe I bounce back and forth. I don't know. But let's not get all existential or anything here. This is gonna be a fun re-cap post!

Fun side-story before I begin: Last year my friends and I went to New York City over winter break on my birthday. We were at this child-themed restaurant, Mars 2112, where it looks like you're on Mars and they have people dressed up like aliens walking around to entertain the children. So this one comes over to our table and asks the six of us where we're from, and my friend Jeff C tells her we all go to the University of Maryland. Another minute into the conversation and it's revealed that it's my birthday so she asks me how old I'm turning, and when I say "19" she is utterly shocked and goes, "You look like you're 15 or something!!" So we all start cracking up and then she has to do this thing where she tells you how old you are in "Mars years" and she stumbles around going, "so that makes you 8 1/2...7 1/2...9 1/2...I don't know, it's whatever you are divided by two." aaaaahahahaha she can't even divide by two when you get that high because she's used to the six- and eight-year-olds. Wow. It was great and hilarious, even if a little insulting...we still quote it now all the time. :P

Anyway, on to the good times of this year:
On my actual birthday, Tuesday the 6th, Kathryn, Connor, and Steve-o took me out to dinner at the Italian Inn, a restaurant near my house. We had a crazy waiter who kept joking around with us. Since it was two guys and two girls he asked if we were double-dating, and then when we said that we were all just friends he refused to believe us. He says to all of us but then turns to me at the end: "Sure you are! I used to double-date when I was your age. What are you, like 17?" hahahaha It happened again! At least I gained two years instead of just one, though haha. And then he proceeded to go around the table to the others saying, "I know you're not 20!" lol It was great. THEN he went on and on about how they all better be treating me and paying for my meal (especially the boys since we are "double-dating"), and he better not see me putting any money in. That made paying very hectic and scary because I had to be all secretive with the money and it was just terrible and took forever, lol. But all in all it was great. Kathryn gave me 20 bucks as repayment for half the Caps ticket from New Year's since we had planned on getting the cheaper seats but were forced to get expensive ones. :P And Steve-o bought me The Office trivia game! I haven't opened it yet because there's no one to play with but I'm excited to bring it back to school and play. :D}

Also two of my aunts called and texted me to say "happy birthday" later that night; I thought it was cute, haha. And I got cards and some money from assorted family members. Oh, and Susie had called me at midnight. Plus on Sunday another aunt brought this mint chocolate cake that was so good and gave me a gift card.

Then on Saturday I went with Kathryn to the UMD basketball game against Georgia Tech. It was stunning when we pulled a win out of that after playing like crap for the first and most of the second halves. You'll read more about this at the end of this entry.
After that we met Caitlin in CP and took the Metro into DC to go to the Museum of Crime and Punishment as another birthday event. It was really neat! There were sections of exhibits with crimes and punishments from Medieval times, the era of Piracy, Colonial Times, the Wild West, and up through today with presidential assassinations, serial killers, computer hackers, and forensic investigations. They had lots of artifacts and information written all over the walls, plus a ton of interactive things to test your trivia knowledge and—most importantly—photo-ops.

A few days ago a package came in the mail and it was from Susie! She sent me a tupperware thing full of homemade cookies! There are two batches, regular chocolate chip and peanut butter w/ peanut butter & chocolate striped chips, and they're both soooooo so so good. There was also a hilarious card...she printed out a picture of Jenson Ackles that we & Telisha were ogling over one time but photoshopped in some inside jokes. :P The whole thing was such a surprise. ♥ And then a few things that happened in the days before came together and I realized the elaborate scheme to surprise me. :P

( Pictures )

More news: another two of my 101 things were completed as a result of this day!

Date: 1/10/09
Task: 057: get shown on a jumbotron and/or tv
Reason: First of all, how cool is that? Second of all, there are SO many chances to get on the jumbotron at Comcast Center. I go to plenty of basketball games at school and half-heartedly attempt to "dance for my dinner," which is this contest where you can win something like a $500 dollar gift card for Beltway Plaza. And we sit so close to the floor, we figure we're bound to get on camera if only the camera guys would take a few steps farther down the line than they usually do. There's also Verizon Center for Caps games, but I didn't really have much hope of getting this one done there.

Well, I didn't need either to happen! (Although we have been on screen at least twice far away in the background of the person singing the national anthem...we haven't counted them, though, since we decided that would be cheating...or a last resort in 2.75 years. :P ) Instead, at the Maryland vs Georgia Tech game Kathryn and I were actually shown on tv on FOX and Raycom. It happened during a weird moment after there was a foul called on GT so our dear Sean Mosley is getting ready to take his free throws...OH WAIT JUST KIDDING one of the refs meant it to be the other way around. Great. So the players walk down to the opposite end of court and the crowd is in a state of confusion. According to my sister watching at home, they showed me and Kathryn looking up at the screen watching the replay. I had my hands on my head and then dropped them to out/in front of me in a what-are-you-thinking?! gesture and you could read my lips going "What???" hahaha I'm famous! :P

Date: 1/10/09
Task: 086: visit a museum in DC other than the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History
Reason: Don't get me wrong, I'm not knocking the Smithsonian...I love me some Smithsonian! It's just that that one happens to be the only one my friends and I have visited whenever we go. So I decided we needed a change and to experience something different. Hence the birthday trip.