More fun

Saturday, November 12: I volunteered at the Kalamazoo Valley Museum. There were kids everywhere! There isn't much to say about it except that I had fun helping the kids and talking to parents. Everyone was really nice. To me at least...a couple kids got yelled at. What can you do? My station was a MESS after it was over. The kids had thrown streamers and scissors and glue and paper and boxes all over the floor! I was very tired after that.

Sunday and Monday, November 13 and 14: Emily came and visited! It was so awesome to see her! I can't wait until she's back for good in January! We basically just sat around and watched movies. Sunday night we went to go see Footloose (the third time for Lindsey and I), because Em hadn't seen it yet. She liked it and we danced all the way out to the car. :) The only downfall of her visit was that I got next to no sleep for a couple days, but it was so worth it!

Thursday November 17: Lindsey, Brandy, Rachel, and I all went to go see Breaking Dawn at midnight! Brandy and Rachel wanted to get there at 10:30 to wait, but Linds and I were like 'no way' and went at 7:30 to save spots. We were the second people in line and the first for our theater. By 8:45, the line was all the way to the door and Lindsey and I got to say "told you so" (we didn't really, of course). But we got the best seats in the theater, even though Lindsey was so excited when they seated us (at 10:10, ahem Brandy and Rach) that she ran right past the door to our theater. Ahahaha. But anyway, it was a much better movie than I thought it would be and Lindsey and I were super pumped all the way home. Brandy didn't like it very much, but she never said why. I agree there were some things that should have been done differently, but hey-I would probably make mistakes if I was remaking a book into a movie too, you know? Poor Rachel got a migraine a little over half way through the movie, but she didn't want to leave, so she just kind of sat there with her eyes closed. She said she would have to go back to see how it ended. I felt bad that she had just sat there, but she seemed to be okay with it.

I know this is really short, but that's all the exciting stuff that has happened since last blog. So, yeah.

I have a test on Tuesday in Precalc...not excited. I can't wait for this semester to be over so that I can be done with that class. I'll miss French a little (mostly Philip and Mary) and I wish my Writing and Literature class wasn't ending! Other than that, I'm ready for a new semester.

Oh! Something cool: I'm taking Psychology next semester and, as an honors student in the class, I have the opportunity to take a lab where we teach behaviors to rats and research the results. Even though it will not be anything breakthrough, I get to go into the fancy research building that students aren't allowed in unless they're doing research (:D), and it will be really helpful for applying what I learn in class. Plus, how many people can say they've done research with rats?

At first I was like "not mandatory? It's at 11 in the morning, when I don't have any classes until 4? Rats? No, thanks." But then I thought about it and I decided it would be a really neat thing to have done.

So, THAT's it.

Love you guys!

A Break from Work

Recently, I've had time to stop working non-stop and spend time with my friends.

For one, the last weekend of October I went to Kalahari with Shawn for our anniversary.

It was nice to get away from Western for a bit and not think about working hard. I couldn't even look at homework because I didn't bring any with me. I left my laptop behind too, so I could completely enjoy my time away and the time I had with Shawn.

We spend quite a while at the waterpark on Saturday. It was a good time. We rode the waterslides, some of which are not for the fainthearted! We also got pictures with a little tiger cub named Jada. She was only ten weeks old and so cute! I have to scan the picture in. We made pottery and spent nearly all night in the arcade. It was great and I needed it.

Yesterday was Brandy's birthday! I spent most of the day with her, except for when we were in class. Her parents invited me and our friend Jenni (Rachel too, but she had class) to dinner with them at Red Robin and then they wouldn't even let us pay for our own meals! It was very kind of them. They invited us again to dinner tonight with Brandy's grandparents at Texas Roadhouse, but I declined, thinking that Brandy should have some strictly family time for her birthday weekend.

After that, we came back to my dorm and picked up Lindsey and Celeste and went over to Burnham hall, where we made Sugar Scrub. It's an organic exfoliant. Brown sugar, honey, olive oil. I haven't used it yet, but I'll let you know.

Then, we went back to Brandy's dorm because she wanted to watch Vampire Diaries and I was going to get ready over there, because we were going to Wild Bull. Wild Bull is a saloon, more or less, which becomes a club at night. Since Brandy was turning 18 and could never get into clubs before, Jenni and I agreed that she should go for her birthday. Jenni's friend Jessica came too. Again, Rachel was supposed to come, but she said something came up so she ended up not coming with us. As far as clubs go, this one was pretty mellow. Thursdays are college night, so it was mostly people our age there. Still, I wouldn't have gone with anyone else I know here at college. They played loud music- the Top 40 hits, pretty much. It's funny because it's pretty country in the saloon and restaurant area. It is near Western after all. Oh well. Either way we had a good time just dancing together and getting some time to enjoy life outside of school.

Brandy told me it was her best birthday to date. I could tell she had a really good time.

I'm so glad I was part of her birthday and such an important one too.

I really hope she and I are friends forever. She's great.

So, Tip # 9-Get away for a little while, so you don't go crazy.

Also, Tip #10-Don't go do things, especially clubbing, without people you trust.

Even if nothing happens, you have that support, because if something WERE to happen that made you uncomfortable, you want someone who can help you escape the situation.

That doesn't just go for the club. No matter where you go, scary things can happen.

I don't even walk to The Den Party Store for a Den Pop after it gets dark unless someone else is with me.

That's all for now. I've got one last midterm paper to write.

Oh yeah, my midterm for Gender and Communication is 5 papers! 4 of which are 2-3 page papers analyzing articles Dr. Wong gave us. The 5th is a reflection on how the class and the papers I wrote have changed the way I view and react to gender. Sound fun?

Not really, but I have been careful to not procrastinate. That's why I only have one left.

I can't say the same for some of my classmates. The midterm is due Tuesday and everyone was saying yesterday in class that they haven't even started writing any of their papers.

It's a wonder to me how people can truly wait until the last minute. Do you want to write 5 papers in a day or two? I finished my first paper on October 25th. I promise you I'm not as stressed as the other people in my class. :)

The Sweet Sound of Friendship

Alas, my roommate has left me until January. With a variety of sicknesses, she fell too far behind to catch up before mid-terms and dropped the semester. For now, I'm alone in my little 12x12. Of course, I have been for awhile now.

Lindsey hardly ever goes to lunch with me on Mondays and Wednesdays, and for awhile she wasn't coming with me to dinner either. That left me to eat with myself.

So,

Tip #7-It's okay to eat alone.

People do it all the time. I see random people sitting all by their lonesome, listening to their iPod, working on homework, reading...it's fine.

However, I don't have that problem anymore, usually, because I have a routine now!

Brandy, the girl I roomed with at Orientation and who is in my Writing and Literature, and I have become good friends. Every Monday and Wednesday I have dinner with her and a bunch of other people. Same place. Same time.

On Mondays, it's usually just Brandy, Maribel (another girl in our class), Rachel (a friend of Brandy's), and myself. However, just yesterday Reegan (another girl in our class! :D) joined us. It was great. After that we went to Sweetwater to get doughnuts and we had a really great time.

Wednesdays, it's Brandy, myself, my friend Aaron (from the Amtrak!), Rachel, and whoever we know who shows up! It's great. We spend HOURS in the caf!

Either way, it's great to have fallen into a routine other than class and homework.

--

So, I've signed up for a Bronco Buddies program, where I am a pen pal/mentor to a 4th grader in Illinois. Her name is Kayla, but her friends call her KK, and she's great so far.

I'm super excited to hear back from her, as I just sent her my first letter after receiving hers.

In the Spring, the other Bronco Buddies and I are all taking a trip to Illinois to meet our pen pals! It'll be great. :)

--

Today was the opening of priority registration (for the Honors Students) and I was very excited to have nearly first pick of classes for the semester.

Then a problem occurred: "You are not permitted to register at this time."

WHAT!?

So, I went to the Lee Honors College and very politely, but slightly frantically, told them my problem. They got me in with an adviser right away. Except, he didn't know why I couldn't register either. No holds on my account...nothing.

Finally, he starts asking around. Well, after about 20 minutes, the head lady at the office, overhears our dilemma and comes up to me and says "do you need Momma's help?"

Apparently, that's what people call her around there.

So, I go into her office and she opens up my info and says "ah ha! Here's your problem. Your Honors Code isn't here." -_-

No one thought to check that?

Turns out, they were all looking at my FALL info, not my SPRING info.

I guess when I went to go see my Major adviser, she somehow erased my code from the system.

"Momma" helped me out in two seconds.

So,

Tip #8-Don't freak out if something isn't how it's supposed to be. It will get fixed. No one wants you to suffer.

That's all for now!

Love.

Smarter Than The Average Freshman

Lately I've been thinking about how much harder my classes are than the people I talk to.

I'm in Pre-Calculus, while a sophomore I know is in Algebra and nearly everyone else took Stats.

I have a Comm class full of juniors and seniors, as I have mentioned before.

My FYE class is Honors, so we're doing a ton of work there, while the general FYE class does next to nothing.

All in all, I began to worry a little that I took on too much too quickly. What if I couldn't get through all the homework? What if I can't keep up and I'm forced to keep failing because I'm dragging behind and no one is stopping to wait for me to get up?

Yesterday, that changed.

I realized that the whole reason I ended up in these classes is because I'm capable of doing the work. No one here wants me to fail and if I have a question, they don't hesitate to answer it. I am prepared for long hours of homework, because that means I'm getting something out of my expensive education.

Here's why I came to this revelation:

Not only did I score 100% on my first essay in Gender and Communication (I'm the only freshman there!), I was complimented, in a humorous way (at least, I thought it was funny).

We had to get into groups to discuss a theory and come up with a skit to show an aspect of it. There were supposed to be 6 to a group.

Sean Stemas, who is a nice guy and says hi to me when he sees me outside of class, counts us and says "Well, we only have five," he thinks for a short moment and then points at me, "that's okay, you can pick up the slack." I must have looked surprised or confused, I certainly felt that way, because he added, "well, you always have to best ideas."

:D

Weekend at Karlie's

I just a great, rather relaxing with Karlie and Brittany, and for a little bit Kallyn.

We sat around and did homework, watched baseball and football, and ate a lot. :)

We also did some shopping, which was good and bad-it got us out of the townhouse, but we bought food! Haha.

It was nice to hang out with people outside of my dorm. As much as I enjoy Em and Lind's company, it was nice to see someone else. Plus, they weren't home this weekend.

I will definitely be over there a lot more often now that I know how awesome it is.

I bought some Bronco Pride and a Den shirt. :)

I was a sale spender though. Everything I bought was on sale, except the stuff at the dollar store, but let's be real-everything is a dollar. That's like being on sale. :P

--

I cleaned the fish tank when I got back tonight. That was...fun. Not really. It was really dirty and the whole bathroom smelled like fish. I had to use a huge spoon to scoop them into cups so I could pour the water out of their tank. I couldn't catch them, so Lindsay's sister had to do it. But I cleaned it and poured them back in.

I listened to some music while I unpacked all my new stuff. Now it's off to bed.

Classes start early tomorrow. I'm going to an art exhibit too, for a cultural event. I went to the play "References to Salvador Dali Make Me Hot" at the University theatre. It was really good, though not what I expected.

It was a very small room with chairs lining the walls and the play was in the middle of the room. It was actually a really cool experience and I'm glad I went.

I met up with Philip, from French class, there and we both agreed that it was 'sensational.'

I don't doubt that this week will be boring, but with any luck it will be like last week-little homework. If that's the case, then if Shawn doesn't come out next weekend, I'm going back to Karlie's. It's likely that will happen-Shawn's been taking a lot of time off work lately. Hopefully I won't spend as much money next weekend. Haha.

Motivation

Class, Class, Food, Homework, Class, Homework, (movie?), bed.

Every day.

By the time I've done everything I HAVE to do for the day, I don't have any motivation to do anything else. >.< Emily is the same way. So we spend our nights watching movies and going to bed early. A couple days ago we were in bed and asleep at 9. Haha. We're so lame. :P

Lindsay joins us, of course.

I think Philip, a guy from my French class, and I are gunna be friends. We talk every morning we have class and we just added each other on Facebook. So yay. :D

--

I'm mostly blogging because I haven't in awhile and I know you guys want to know what's going on. Nothing. That's what's going on. I don't even mind at this point, because I would feel bad about saying I had too much homework.

I have so much homework. I think I've said that already, and how that's okay with me because then I'm not bored.

I thought there would be a bunch of clubs I want to join, but there isn't really anything that is interesting to me and anything that sounded kinda cool I couldn't get any information on. Once I can balance my homework time a little better, maybe I'll go out around campus and just start talking to people. O.O

--

I went to advising for Speech Pathology on Wednesday, so I'm officially a Speech Pathology Major with Elementary Ed minor! YAAAAY!

The adviser said that even though I'm only a freshman, my unofficial transcript and my personality have her convinced that I'll make it into the professional program to get my bachelor's. So, that was nice, because other than that my day wasn't so great.

I'm glad I'm on track and I'm so happy to know that she'll be there to help me every step of the way, so I'm not just blindly trying to get a major. That's nice.

Well, I think that's it.

So, Tip #6-Keep pushing through. It may not be AS exciting as everyone said, but give it time.

CentralxWestern Weekend

Whoa!

So, we rocked. Our football team did, anyway. Haha. All I did was stand and cheer and clap and whoop and sing the fight song over and over-cause we kept getting touchdowns!

In the first quarter, one of our guys intercepted at the Chip's 30 yard line and took it all the way to our 5! I wish I'd caught it on tape. It was amazing! We would have gotten a touchdown right then, but a central guy caught him from the side. They showed the replay, like, three times. :P

That was a look into how the rest of the game would go. We continued to make awesome plays and Central continued to let us. They did manage two touchdowns-how, I'm not sure.

With a final score of 44-14, I'm surprised the Chips didn't just go home crying.

All in all, I actually enjoyed to football game, to my surprise. I think it's because I really wanted us to win-I mean, we couldn't have let Central beat us!

Shawn and I got mega burnt. We didn't put any suntan lotion on, because the weather said it was 60, felt like 51. So, now we both have raccoon faces, because it was so bright at the game (it was at noon, so the sun was right above us) and we never took our sunglasses off.

I'm sure plenty of people were partying, but it was quiet here in the valleys.

Shawn and I watched some netflix-Arthur (the original, not the one with Russel Brandt!) and fell asleep around midnight.

Kinda lame? Oh well. :D

--

Sunday was quiet for us too. We were both kinda achy from standing on those bleachers and we decided to just hang out in the dorm and watch some more netflix. We did go to Meijer, because I needed more milk. We ended up buying soda as well, and microwave mac and cheese, and aloe for our poor faces, and he got himself a filtering water bottle and Saving Private Ryan, which we watched when we got back. Yeah.

We went out again for dinner, except that everywhere we wanted to go was either closed or too expensive. Eventually, we just went to the Grotto, which is the bar and grille right off campus, by The Den, where we went for Den Pops after dinner. :)