Life Post: Spanish, English, and Spilled Drinks

It's been a week since my last life post, so I haven't updated since classes started. Things have been pretty hectic this week as I get back into the swing of things and figure out how much time each class is going to take up and all of that. I still have three classes I haven't been to yet (because one was cancelled on Tuesday, one is only once a week, and one is arranged and in the process of being set up for next week), so I still don't really know what my workload will look like this semester. So far, with the three classes I've been to, it's not bad at all, but that's obviously only half of the classes I'm going to have.

I'm liking my classes so far though. I was nervous about Spanish since doing well in this class relies on retaining the information from last semester. Plus, we have to speak in Spanish almost entirely this semester, which is pretty intimidating even though we had to speak Spanish a ton last semester too of course. The professor makes it less scary though because he's great about it when we forget a word and have to switch to English (but he makes us repeat it in Spanish once we've figured it out), so that helps. It's kind of funny because he also pronounces my name wrong every single time (with a "k" instead of an "h"), and the entire class has tried pronouncing it for him to get it right, but that hasn't helped. It'll be interesting if I'm "Kaley" all semester.

The other two classes I've been to so far are a class on this history of English, which is about both how English came about and developed as well as how to teach grammar to students (as it's primarily for future English teachers) and a class on Shakespeare. I find the history of language pretty fascinating actually, and grammar has never really bored me even though it's not the most fascinating thing in the entire world (even though I could ramble forever about how it's actually pretty awesome that we've put together all these rules in order to help ourselves understand each other but I won't do that).

As for the Shakespeare class, I'm probably most excited for it so far. I think it's going to be really great. It's one of those things where the professor is so obviously passionate about what she's teaching us, which always makes a class better, and the class as a whole also seems really excited about it and not at all like the absolute dread that seemed to be so prevalent when we studied Shakespeare in high school. Plus, we're reading plays that aren't often taught in high school classes, which is also exciting, and we're reading both Hamlet and A Midsummer Night's Dream, which are my two favorite plays. I've studied Hamlet before in another college class (with the same teacher actually), but I've never read A Midsummer Night's Dream in a class.

In non-school related news, I dumped Pepsi on my pretty new laptop yesterday. I'm really angry at myself. I was even drinking out of a bottle with a cap and everything. I had the cap off for about five seconds and managed to do it. The only good part of this is that the laptop seems to be working fine other than some of the keys sticking, which is obviously making writing this extremely difficult. Any key that I hit with my right hand has to be pressed really hard in order to work. I tried cleaning up the keyboard as best I could yesterday, but I can't really get under the keys. I'm hoping this will go away eventually, but I honestly have no idea if this will be a problem with they keyboard for a long time or not. It's just amazing to me that I had my old laptop for years and never did this, but I've had this one less than half a year and managed to do this. But again, at least the computer still works. I'm thankful for that.

Remember how I talked about starting another blog? That's up now. I posted the first post about a week ago, but I haven't posted here since then in order to mention it here. That blog is going to be more of a writing blog while this one stays as basically what it is now. I know I talk about my writing here sometimes in these life posts, but over there I'm going to have posts entirely about things I'm writing or whatever else I want to talk about that pertains to writing. I also think I'll post actual things I write that are shorter at least occasionally. That does include some sorts of things that I probably would have just posted here in the past, but generally speaking, this blog will be the same. I'll still do these life posts here and reviews as well as other posts like always (even though those "other" sorts of posts have been extremely infrequent for months now primarily due to lack of time).

The first post over there is actually a character interview. I "interviewed" Ledia, who is the main character in a series I've been working on for years now. I think I've mentioned it several times in posts over the past several years, although I'm not all that sure about how much detail I've gone into. You can learn more by going over there though.

I've actually managed to post four Youtube videos since my last life post, so that's quite an accomplishment, especially compared to recently. I reviewed two books: No Higher Honor by Condoleezza Rice and Catholicism by Robert Barron. I also did a "life vlog" on the day that I just happened to learn that I have three cavities. And, finally, I reviewed the second half of Supernatural season four.

Anyway, I don't have much longer before I have to be to class, and this is actually one of the classes I haven't been to yet. It'll be the only music class I've taken in college other than the music portion of humanities, so I don't really have a good idea what to expect. Hopefully it'll go well though and I won't feel too out of place. I have no idea how many people in there will be music majors, but I'm hoping there will be at least a few other people there who aren't.

Book Review: Unsoiled by Lelia Eye

ISBN: 0993797725
Published: September 2nd, 2014
Publisher: One Good Sonnet Publishing
Read from November 21st to December 9th, 2014
Synopsis from Goodreads:

"Look, Poppy! It's Bella of the Cinders. She certainly doesn't look like 'The Beauty' now, does she? Not with that rat's nest of hair or those filthy chicken arms. Maybe we should start calling her 'Cinderbella.'" Nettle started laughing as if she had said the cleverest thing in the world, and I heard Poppy weakly join in.
I didn't look at them; I just continued cleaning the ashes and soot, aware that it was on my face and hands and clothes, aware that the picture I made was a far cry from the beauty my father had always praised. Why should I have cared whether or not my hands were soiled with soot? What need did I have for beauty anymore?
************************************************************
An Escape from Oppression . . .
Elle's life is turned upside down when tragedy strikes. Her stepmother and stepsisters treat her as Cinderbella, forcing her to do manual labor to the point of exhaustion. It would be easy enough to accept Thorny's overtures, yet the inequality that exists between them seems an unsurpassable gulf.
But when Thorny suggests they go to the nearby kingdom of Airland in quest of a mythical sword whose bearer will be made queen, Elle sees her opportunity to start a new life, freed from the oppression of her stepmother. The thought that she might have to face such challenges as hungry dwarves, land pirates, and angry chimeras never crosses her mind.

Review:

Unsoiled is the second book in the Smothered Rose trilogy. I reviewed the first book, Thorny, back in October.

I originally picked up the first book in the trilogy because I love Beauty and the Beast and am always interested in retellings, but while reading, I had really liked how the author tied in a lot of different fairy tales into the story. This book has even more of that. There are elements from many different fairy tales, and I thought they were all brought together really well. Plus, it was kind of fun to pick out which fairy tales different parts of the story came from.

After the first book, I was a bit curious about where the story was going to go. The first one concluded very nicely but also had an ending hinting at more. I just wasn't sure what that "more" would be. I really like where the author has taken the story though. It's very different from the first book, but in a really nice way. The characters are all still fantastic, and I like how they're continuing their growth even though the story itself has completely shifted focus. Plus, I think the second book ended in a way that's more open-ended than the first book. It seems like it's going to lead into the third book really well.

I would highly recommend this series to anyone who enjoys fairy tale retellings. It's a really, really great one, and I'm looking forward to reading the third book.

I received this book from the author in exchange for an honest review.

Life Post: The Final Days of Break

I'm having one of those times where break has caused me to somewhat lose track of time, which makes the idea that school starts back next week seem so odd. I'm having a hard time believing it. I always forget how short winter break feels every year until it's coming to a close again. I feel like "a month" sounds like it's going to last a lot longer than it ever actually does.

Anyway, I've been pretty focused on writing the past couple of days, and it'll probably be that way for the next few days as well. I'm working on a new fanfiction, and I actually think there's a good chance I'll finish it this week before I have to go back to school. It'll still need to be edited and everything, but it'll be nice knowing it's written.

Since I talked about it so much on here, I should also really let you all know that I posted the first chapter of my new Hunger Games fanfiction called Move On and Recover. I should have mentioned it in my last life post, but I got a bit too distracted about finding out about cavities that I'm surprised I even remembered to mention anything else. (I've been pretty obsessive with the brushing my teeth and flossing more thoroughly than ever for the past couple of days by the way. We'll see how long I keep it up.)

Anyway, I haven't actually gotten anywhere near as much writing done today as I would like, so I really need to get to that. It's getting a bit harder to write the closer I get to the ending, but it hasn't become to sluggish of a process quite yet. We'll see how it keeps going.

Life Post: Cavities and a New Blog

Today honestly hasn't been the greatest day that it could have been. I didn't sleep much last night because I was struggling to get a video up, so I've spent most of the day in a haze of tiredness, which also means I haven't gotten nearly as much done as I would have liked.

The biggest thing though happened at my dentist appointment. A year ago or so they told me that I had some areas on my teeth that they wanted to watch, so I knew it was only a matter of time before I got cavities. Lo and behold, I have three. I've actually only gotten one cavity before, but it was on a baby tooth, so they never bothered to fill it. I have gotten my wisdom teeth removed, so I know this can't be anything close to that. Still, I tend to get freaked out about things that involve any sort of anesthesia. I still have more spots they're watching too, so I'm also worried they'll turn into cavities. They fill like ticking time bombs. I'm really good about brushing my teeth though, and while I have probably flossed more than a lot of other people in the past, I definitely want to make it something I remember to do every single time I brush my teeth. Plus, I got prescription toothpaste to use, so I really hope that helps.

In brighter news, you know how I've been talking about starting a second blog? I know it's been really slow going, but I'm so close to actually letting people know about it. I've had the actual blog set up for maybe a month, but I've been continuously changing things around. I'm still kind of messing with the layout and whatnot, but I'm mostly happy with it. I also wrote the first post for it today, but I'm not posting it quite yet. It's really close though, so I'm excited about that.

In video news, I posted two videos. (One of which is the reason I got almost no sleep last night.) I posted the first "life vlog" of 2015. I also finally got around to filming and editing my review of the Korra series finale. It's really bittersweet knowing that it's the last review of Korra that I'll ever do, but I went through all of the really sentimental stuff at the end of the review, so I'll refrain from it all now. I may even do something special for Avatar: The Last Airbender's ten year anniversary next month. Like a post about how I became a fan or why I love it or something along those lines. I feel like it deserves it.

Life Post: So... I Got My License. Finally.

First blog post of 2015! I hope you have all had an awesome start to the year. Mine's been pretty good I think.

All of my days since winter break started have more or less blurred together, so I'm struggling to think about what exactly it is that has happened since my last post on Christmas. I think the absolute biggest thing though would be that I got my license! Yep. After more than five years of struggling with that, I finally have a license. I really can't believe it. The actual card itself only came in the mail today even though I passed my test and got a temporary paper one a week ago. It's also weird seeing the "under 21 until..." thing gone as well, and now it's horizontal instead of vertical (not sure about other states but in Indiana you get vertical IDs until you're 21 in order to be carded easier). It's just a really odd feeling to know I don't have to worry about getting my license anymore because I already have it.

Other than that the only other "big" thing I can think of is that I got two new pairs of glasses. I got a new pair from the eye doctor as well as ordering an extra pair online (even though I also have my old glasses as an extra pair since it's the same prescription). The online pair came in the mail yesterday, and I picked up the other pair from the doctor today. I like them both so far. The pair from the doctor, which I'm going to primarily wear, is blue with this kind of textured stripe design on the sides. My extra pair is the first pair of plastic glasses that I've owned. They're black on the outside with a little bit of purple lining the sides, but the inside of them is completely purple, so I'm incredibly excited about that. I may wear them sometimes just for fun if I'm being honest. I need to wear them long enough to see if my eyes adjust just to make sure they work well anyway since they came from online.

I didn't mention this in my Christmas post because it was still uploading, but I reviewed Disney's A Christmas Carol on Christmas over on my Youtube channel. I also reviewed episodes 211-220 of Naruto Shippuden over there, which was the first Naruto review I'd done on Youtube in four months. And then just yesterday I posted my December 2014 wrap-up and January 2015 TBR, which is basically me going through all of the books I read in December and all of the ones I plan to read this month.

I only have a week left of my winter break, so I'm hoping to be really productive with writing this week. I finished working on Move On and Recover, my newest Hunger Games fanfiction, this past week. I'm going to actually post the first chapter tomorrow. Then on Monday I'm going to start working on a completely new fanfiction that I'm pretty excited about. That will probably be a good deal of what I'm doing for the last week of break.