My Busy Day Isn't Quite so Busy

Tuesdays are usually my busiest days, but thanks to my psychology class being canceled, today hasn't really been that bad.  I woke up only slightly later than I would have if I still had to go to psychology, and after my Sims game needed to update instead of letting me play, I decided to use the extra time to do homework.  I managed to get all of my work done before it was even eleven o'clock.  It was great.

It felt kind of odd not having to go to class until one in the afternoon though, especially considering it's so dark and rainy outside that you couldn't really tell what time of day it was.  The science lab went okay, but we were working with microscopes the entire time.  This class has made me realize that I really dislike microscopes.  I never had a problem in past science classes, but in this class we do labs where we're constantly looking in microscopes for about two hours, and I've discovered that gives me a massive headache before it's over.  I could never be a scientist who has to do that on a regular basis.  Not to mention that the sketches we have to draw of what we see are downright horrible.  I can't draw anything, but how do I distinguish things that are mostly just blobs from one another?

I just finished watching an episode of Naruto, but I was zoned out for about half of it.  You'd think getting out of my first class would lead me to being more awake, but no such luck.  I'm blaming the rainy weather.  I'm going to try and watch an episode of How I Met Your Mother after this, but who knows how well I'll be able to pay attention.

I also still have my night class.  I'm hoping that will go by quickly.  Last week wasn't too bad, so let's hope for the best.  I just find it so hard to stay awake and attentive at that time of day/night.

Here Comes the Craziness

I probably shouldn't be taking time to write this because I still have homework, but I figure it's Saturday and I'll get it done eventually.  Today is just one of those days where I want to procrastinate.  It makes sense considering Twitter and Tumblr today.  How can I not be distracted from homework when it's the first day of One Direction's Take Me Home tour and everyone's going crazy?

It probably wouldn't have been too bad if there'd only been one show today.  A few hours of One Direction craziness and the rest of the day for work.  But they had to schedule two shows today.  I spent this morning following the matinee show, and now in just about an hour there's going to be another one.  And I've still managed to do nothing but a bit of reading for politics.  I still have an annotated bibliography and psychology paper to work on.  It'll be interesting to see what I actually get done.

I am really excited for this tour.  The Up All Night tour was so much fun, and I didn't even get to go.  This time I'm actually going to one of the concerts!  And the time during the concerts is some of the best times on Twitter and Tumblr for the One Direction fandom.  I'm definitely looking forward to it all.  The next nine months are going to be crazy!  But hopefully not as distracting as today (at least until May) because I do have to get some work done...

Injuries and Ice

Today's one of those days where I'm quite glad that it's Friday.  This week wasn't particularly hard or draining or anything until these past couple of days.  I think it started when the fire alarm went off in our building in the middle of the night a couple of days ago.  Needless to say, I didn't get much sleep that night, and the next day was spent being extremely worn out.

Other than that not much happened this week.  As I mentioned in my last post, I injured my finger earlier this week by scraping it against my razor.  I'm fine now, but going a couple of days barely being able to type or write anything is a little difficult when you're a college student.  Taking notes was not fun for those couple of days.

Also, when we woke up this morning everything was covered in a layer of ice.  They'd managed to clean off a few of the sidewalks, but most of them were still covered when I went to class.  I was really hoping that at least my first couple of classes would be canceled, but no such luck.  I may have slid around a bit, but at least I made it to class uninjured.  By this afternoon most of it was gone, but you still had to be careful because there were just random patches in some places.

Now, I'm going to get back to the documentary on African animals that I'm watching.  I've become obsessed with them lately and want nothing more than to go on a safari in Africa.  So I'm off to learn about jaguars!

Past Friendships

(First of all, it's been like five days since I posted.  I had every intention of posting yesterday, but apparently fate decided it would be a good idea to injure my finger.  Typing was too much of a hassle yesterday as I had to do it without using my left index finger.  It still hurts a little, but typing's much easier, so I'm finally posting.)

Sometimes I'm just sitting around thinking about the past, and I get a strong urge to contact some of the people I used to be friends with as a kid and no longer speak to.  I don't necessarily have the urge to talk to everyone I know.  There are a couple of people that I have no problem leaving their friendship in the past.  However, there are several people I used to be friends with that I miss so much that I just wish I could call them up and talk to them again.  The really strange thing is the people I miss the most are probably the ones where the friendship ended the most dramatically.

I've been lucky enough that I've never had a friendship end in a way that led to us hating each other.  If I came face-to-face with anyone I used to be friends with, it may be awkward, but we would get along fine.  Even though I have several ex-best friends that I'm no longer best friends with because of a certain situation (that I'm not going to talk about) we did end as friends and I continued to speak to them at least occasionally  at school until we graduated.

I know that these friendships ended for a reason.  And I'm extremely blessed that two of my best friends in the world have been around for more than half my life.  Katrina and I have been friends since kindergarten, and Summer and I have been friends since first grade.  The two of them have been my friends as most (actually I think all) of these other friendships have ended.  Those two mean so much to me, and I think it says a lot about our friendships that I'm still friends with them and not other past friends.

Katrina moved away in middle school, and Summer moved away after sixth grade, came back in eighth grade, and then moved away again after sophomore year of high school.  Our main forms of communication are texting.  Katrina and I especially have gone through long periods (mostly during the first few years of high school) where we hardly spoke at all because of circumstances.  Even through all of that, we've stayed friends.  When I see the two of them it's as if we were never separated, and I trust them with everything.  I'm extremely lucky to have them both as friends and for as long as I have.

Even though I've managed to keep two of my childhood friends, I still miss a few of the others.  A couple of the friends I just grew apart from, and those are the ones I have an easy time getting over.  It's the couple of friends where I made a conscious decision that I needed out of the friendship that I wish I could go back and be friends with them again.  It may sound odd. You'd think it would be the other way around.  But I sometimes wonder if there could have been a better way to work things out.  We were in middle school.  We were immature.  I think I really did need to get out of that situation at the time, but now that we're older, could the friendships work again if we tried? I think it's possible.  Of these two past friends, I became friends with one of them again in the last two years of high school, and although we're not close and haven't spoken since graduation, things were fine.  The other past friend and I have had maybe five conversations since middle school (and that's being generous) and all of them were awkward.  Does that mean I should give up or try to reconnect with her through Facebook?  Are we so different now that it wouldn't work?  Katrina, Summer, and I are entirely different people too now, but we make our friendships work.  I just don't know.  And I don't know if I should try or not.

A Much Needed Break

Today has consisted of doing basically nothing, and I'm actually extremely thankful for it.  I was so worn out yesterday after spending the day with my family and my allergies being so bad.  I took medicine early today and felt much better.  It was also an extremely light day as far as homework goes.  I did have some work to do, but it was almost nothing.  I got it done and out of the way quicker than I have all semester.  Other than a bit of homework and going to church, I had nothing to do.

So I basically spent my entire day sitting around doing nothing, which was incredibly welcome after how stressed I was last week from work and then seeing my family yesterday.  I've spent most of my day watching television shows and documentaries on my computer.  I've watched several documentaries on animals in Africa that I've found on Netflix over the past week or so, and I've loved them.  It makes me want to visit Africa so badly.

I'm sure I'll get a bunch more work tomorrow.  My Monday's usually suck just because of how much a dread Tuesdays and how busy I am on those days.  I try to make the most of it though.  Hopefully tomorrow will be good!

Book Review: Witch Hunt by K.C. Blake

ISBN: 1475107277
Published: April 19th, 2012
Publisher: self-published
Read from January 29th to February 5th, 2013
Synopsis from Goodreads:

A magical game of Hide n Seek begins.
Find the missing player and win.
The game resets; everyone forgets and starts to play it again.
Starr Hughes hasn’t believed in magic since her mother died. As a reporter for the school paper, she believes in hard facts. Hiding under the headmaster’s desk, planting bugs, and breaking into a fellow student’s home are all on her to-do list. So when she hears the mysterious group known as the It-Squad are about to start playing a secretive game, she wants to know more. She’s especially interested in the group’s gorgeous leader, Dylan Winchester.
With her boy-crazy best friend at her side, Starr is going to discover that not only are witches real, they need her help. Someone is using the game to steal their memories, their powers, and perhaps their lives.

Review:

I should note that this is the second book in The Witch-Game series, but it's not at all necessary to have read the first book in order to enjoy this one.  This book has new main characters and an entirely different plot.

I absolutely loved this book.  It kept my mind going the entire time because I kept thinking that I may have things figured out only to discover something new that changed things.  Even when I did have something right, I'd end up doubting that I was right only to find out later that I had been right.  Other times I couldn't even figure it out.  It's definitely a book that keep you thinking.  I wish I could talk about that in more detail, but then this post would just turn into me gushing about the book forever with a bunch of spoilers.

As much as I loved the first book in the series, I think I loved this one even more.  The concept of the game is somewhat confusing at first, but everything makes sense at the end.  In fact, the entire plot basically depends on the characters and readers being confused, and at times I was worried things would still be confusing at the end.  I shouldn't have worried though because everything was very clear by the end of the book.

I would greatly recommend this book to just about anyone.  I loved it!

Family Visit

I can't believe I've found the energy to write this blog post, but somehow I'm managing it.  Today was a good day since my family came up to Indianapolis to visit.  We didn't do much other than go out to eat, go to Walmart, and go to the mall.  We cam really close to going to the zoo, but that didn't happen...

It was nice seeing them though, and it was fun.  I just wish that my allergies hadn't decided to act up today.  I'm feeling pretty miserable.  Still, I had a good time.  (And now I'm stocked up on snacks and food until spring break. Haha.)

I have some homework to get done now, but hopefully it won't take too much time.  I want to read some today as well.  Let's hope I don't end up falling asleep before everything is done.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentine's Day, everybody!  So far my celebrating has consisted of watching Little House on the Prairie and eating the Fun Dip that our RA gave everyone on our floor.  I'm not one of those people who absolutely despises Valentine's Day, but I've never really done much to celebrate it either.  I still have some chocolate and other candy that my family sent me for Valentine's Day, and I plan on eating some of it today as well.  Candy is basically the best part of Valentine's Day.

I've done most of my homework for today, but I want to study psychology a bit still.  Other than that, I don't have any work that I still need to get done today.  Thursdays are when I only have one class, so I'm usually able to get my work done pretty early.  Hopefully psychology won't take too long!

Why I Hate Radio

Sometimes I feel like the only person in the world who doesn't listen to the radio.  In all honesty, I don't understand why anyone listens to the radio.  It's just the same songs over and over.  (Unless you're lucky enough to have Sirius radio or something that actually has more variety.)

I think my hatred for radio became even stronger over the years I worked for my aunt in her tanning salon though.  When you listen to the radio in the car for short trips, it doesn't really have time to frustrate you.  When you're laying in a tanning bed for twenty or less minutes, the radio doesn't have time to frustrate you.  When you're sitting there listen to the radio all day long while every single person tans, you start to realize just how repetitive the radio really is.  There were maybe four radio stations that the majority of people would turn on, and of those four, there was one turned on most frequently.  It was the local top 40 station, and I'm not exaggerating when I say that there was no way they played more than maybe 20 different songs on any given day.

Needless to say, when people left I immediately turned the radio off.  People would come in to lay, and it would be silent.  I can't even tell you the number of people who would say something along the lines of, "Isn't it boring in here?  How come you don't have the radio on?"  I don't know.  Maybe it's because I've heard the same song at least ten times today, and it wasn't even that good of a song in the first place.

Still to this day, I can't listen to most of the popular songs (pop or country) that came out while I worked there because it immediately brings back memories of hearing it over and over again.  If a song made it into the top five or something during that time, I probably hate it.  It kind of sucks because some of the songs were decent, but I just can't listen to them again.  I'm pretty sure they have completely reached the quota of times I can hear them in my life.  It makes me extremely grateful for cars that have CD players.

A Good Monday?

As far as Mondays go, today's been pretty decent.  My allergies are getting bad again, but I'm used to dealing with that.  I also woke up with a really sore neck, but it's gotten better as the day's progressed.

We had our first test in philosophy today.  I was kind of worried because I thought it would be difficult even though I didn't see how it could be that hard.  While there were a few difficult questions, most of it seemed relatively easy (let's hope I didn't jinx myself), and I was done in about twenty minutes.  Let's hope the rest of the tests are like that.

The rest of my classes were basically the same as normal.  We discussed a short novel we read in English today, and I spoke up more than I probably have all year.  I was pretty impressed with myself.  I just felt like I had things to say.  I think the professor was impressed.  She's been trying to get me to talk more all semester, and at the end of class she said that was the most successful discussion we've had so far.  It was pretty fun.

I don't have much work to get done today, and I'm relishing it because tomorrow is my busiest day of the week.  I just need  to read a bit more for politics, finish up my psychology paper (which I'm not looking forward to), and maybe do a little work for English.

Sick Yet Again

Today is not a good day.  I woke up this morning with a horrible headache, so one of the first things that I did upon waking up was take medicine.  I was also burning up when I woke up, which I thought was odd since my roommate turns the AC on when we sleep, but it wasn't until an hour or so later that I realized that I might have a fever.  I don't have a thermometer at school, so I can't check.  I'm almost positive that I'm still running a temperature though.  In addition to that I just feel really miserable.

I skipped church today because of how bad I felt, but unfortunately being sick doesn't mean I can slack off on homework.  Too many things need to be done.  So far I've finished up one assignment and turned it in online and made progress on several other assignments.  I'm pretty proud of how much I've gotten done considering how I feel.  I just want to get some work done on my next portfolio for English, and I think I'll be good for the day.  Then I can spend the rest of the day sitting around miserable but not having to work on anything.

Eating Hot Batter

As I'm writing this I'm eating this microwaveable cake thing that ended up half as a baked cake and half as just hot batter.  It has caramel on it though, so I really don't care about anything else.

Today hasn't been all that exciting.  I had two tests earlier, and one of them was my first ever blue book exam.  I think they both went fairly well though.  I have tests on Monday and Tuesday as well, so I've got to do some studying this weekend.

I've spent my evening watching Little House on the Prairie, and now I think I'm going to go watch something on Netflix.  This has been a horrible post, but it's been a long week for me.  You have no idea how much I've been looking forward to the weekend.

Book Review: Faded Denim by Melody Carlson

ISBN: 1576835375
Published: June 15th, 2006
Publisher: Think
Read from January 24th to 28th, 2013
Synopsis from Goodreads:

All of Emily's friends seem so perfect: skinny and pretty and fun and flirty. Emily loathes her slightly overweight body, and as her secret bitterness begins to eat away at her soul, she faces the dark prospect of developing an eating disorder.
This ninth book in the TrueColor teen fiction series, Faded Denim takes a serious look at the important issues of body image and eating disorders. Includes discussion questions.

Review:

As I was reading this book, I had very strong mixed feelings about it.  Now that it's been a week or so since I finished, I can't really remember much of what I thought was wrong with it though.  However, I think that actually says a lot.  I don't think this book was as powerful as it had the potential to be.  It was just kind of forgettable.

This is a Christian book, so God and religion was talked about quite a bit.  I don't have a problem with that, but I don't think it was dealt with in the same possible way.  This may sound bad, but I almost thought as if all of these characters were too strong in their faith.  Every teenager in this book was praying constantly and never really doubted God.  I just feel as if Emily should have been struggling a bit more considering she was dealing with an eating disorder.  I thought it was interesting how she constantly justified the eating disorder to herself and to God throughout the book, but I just think there could have been more done there.

I thought eating disorders were handled well enough, but the story never really made me emotional.  This girl is literally starving herself.  I should have felt more emotion than I did.  I think a lot of it was Emily's lack of emotion.  I don't know much about eating disorders, but I feel as if she should have gotten a lot more emotional than she ever did.  She seemed far too calm the entire time.  Even once she realized she was sick and wanted help, there weren't really any emotions.  Not only did that not make sense to me, but it made it so I wasn't that affected by the book.  It basically made the book more forgettable.

The book wasn't horrible by any means.  I just think there was a lot of potential there, and instead it was just kind of unemotional and didn't deal with things as well as it should have.

Exhausted

I'm utterly exhausted.  I'm amazed that I was able to force myself to write this.  I don't know why, but I was really worn out the past two days and it's only worse today.  To make matters worse today's my night class. I don't know how I'm going to make it through it.

I did manage to get homework done, which is impressive considering Tuesdays are so hectic for me and today was even worse.  A lot happened today, and while none of it was incredibly huge or exciting, it's just left me feeling tired and wanting to go to bed.  And when I'm tired I tend to get really irritated, and let's just say that a lot of people on Twitter are stressing me out.  I should really get off of it, but we all know that won't happen.

Let's just hope I make it through class without falling asleep.  It'll be an accomplishment.

Climbing Over People in Church

I think I'm pretty much over being sick, and I couldn't be more thankful for that.  I don't have to continuously take cold medicine anymore, so that's definitely a positive.

It's been snowing most of the day (and yesterday), so we've got a decent amount of snow outside right now. Luckily I think it's staying just below freezing though, so we could be worse off temperature wise.  And my college does a really good job of keeping the sidewalks clear, so getting across campus isn't much trouble at all.

I ended up over sleeping this morning because I turned my alarm off and fell back asleep.  Thankfully I did manage to get up before church.  It would have been pretty bad if I slept through church since there's no evening mass today thanks to the Super Bowl.  (Speaking of the Super Bowl, if I had a TV I'd totally be watching the Puppy Bowl today.)  At church, I ended up having to climb over people to get back to my seat after communion, so that was probably somewhat amusing for the people behind us.  We were at the end of the lines for communion, so I had to switch and go to the other priest.  That meant I had to walk around to get back to the other side.  I was kind of in the middle of the row, and my friends and the people on the opposite end of the row had already knelt down.  They way our college's chapel is set up, there's not much room in between the kneelers and the chairs, so I was basically quite literally climbing over my friends.  Let's be glad I didn't fall on my face.

I haven't been too productive as far as homework goes today.  I managed to read and get a quiz done for politics, and I printed off my English paper, although I'm still kind of iffy on it.  I also made some progress on the pretend class newsletter I have to make for my technology in education class.  I still have some room left, and I've run out of ideas for things to say about my fake class.  Hopefully I can come up with some ideas.  I have a little more than a week to finish that up and make too pretend flyers as well.  I'm using OpenOffice instead of Microsoft Publisher or Word like the others in the class, and I'm having a bit of a hard time formatting everything.  Hopefully it'll look decent when I'm finished.

I still need to do some reading for psychology and philosophy (plus I need to start my writing assignment for psychology), but I've had an episode of Little House paused for a while, so I think I'm going to finish that up first.  Hopefully I'll get everything that I wanted to do today done!

(Can we just take a moment to appreciate what I named this post.  I need to take a class on how to come up with titles...)

A Homework Filled Saturday

Today has been a long day.  I had a lot of homework, and I spent a lot of time today working on it.  It wasn't too bad though, and I did manage to get some reading in as well.  Overall though, it was just a boring Saturday of working.

It also snowed yet again today.  Amazingly though, it was warmer that it has been the past several days.  I was surprised when I went to the dining hall this morning.  I'd expected it to be colder if anything, but I was much less frozen after walking across campus than I had been going to and from classes lately.

This is a really short post, but I'm having a lot of trouble concentrating.  I don't know what it is, but I figure homework tired me out. It's not even nine, and I already feel like going to bed.  I'm going to go listen to a Hunger Games podcast though and try to stay awake for a little while longer.