We have a Dog!!! My sister Erica has been bugging my parents to get another dog since Chester died last summer (while we were in Wisconsin) and they finally caved. She is a very cute, very sweet, very sociable, medium-sized dog that looks like a miniature golden retriever. We've named her Bella.
The way we got the dog was rather unique. My sister Erica has been going to the vet's office to "shadow" several times. (She wants to work with animals.) When she went this past Monday, she saw her first operation. It was on a dog that was being spayed. She saw the liver and the stomach and other entrails when they opened her up. Oddly enough, however, they found no uterus. Apparently this dog had already been spayed. So, they just sewed her back up and didn't have to do anything else. Anyway, the dog had been brought in by the Humane Society, not an owner, so we decided to buy her. Bella is somewhere between one and two years old, and she is the friendliest dog I've ever seen in my life.
Last weekend I helped with a video-taping of the MBTI video. I got to play several of the personality types as well as a narrator. If you've never heard of the MBTI (Myers-Briggs Type Indicator) before, it's a theory which can categorize people's typical behavior. It's a helpful theory to know in general, as it can shed a lot of light on why particular people frequently get along, while others are always fighting. (If you hang around the honors hall or the honors lounge enough, you'll eventually hear people throwing out letters and laughing. This is because the MBTI is a sort of honors program 'in joke'. We're all taught it in our freshman honors 1010 course.) If you want to learn more, go here to find out what you are, then go here or here for accurate discriptions on what each type means. (Socionics seems a bit bogus in their discriptions, but their test is good.)
As for my spring break plans, they can be encapsulated in two words: sleeping, reading. I'm going to be relaxing this time around, and I think this will be a much needed brain break. Other than that, only two interesting things will happen. #1: Erica, Mom, and I will be going to see "The Taming of the Shrew" at TPAC on Thursday. (It's Shakespeare's most sexist plays, and, therefore, not one of my favorites, but it should still be fun.) #2. Lancaster is performing in Franklin on Friday night. I WILL be attending. Saturday I'll probably head back to school so that I can get everything in order there again before I start classes. Then, it's back to life as usual. That's all I've got for now. Laterz!
What have I been up to lately? Let's see ... The Backdoor Playhouse just finished it's run of "Closer", a student directed production in which I got to lurk around backstage in black clothes and throw around furniture. It was a very good show. A bit vulgar and risque for the more conservative, but I found it extremely well written. The plot was a bit soap opera-ish (four characters facing rough and tumble love lives), but the dialogue smacked of real life, and the characters were complex and intriguing. Oh, and the music they used was great. All British stuff (I think). Thankfully, everyone involved with the show got a copy of the soundtrack.
I had two midterms this past week: Chemistry and History of the English Language. Made B's on both of them. I am happy with this.
I've added a new link to my site. The "Controversial Linkage" page will be a place for me to list sites that I find worth reading, but which involve issues which might not be palatable to everyone. Personally, I am a major supporter of free speech, and believe that exposing oneself to ideas which are difficult to accept is a healthy practice. Discussing controversial issues increases both awareness and tolerance, and keeps people thinking rather than blindly accepting the status quo. So, feel free to explore the links there, and let me know what you think. Oh, and if anyone has suggestions for worthwhile links I could add, PLEASE let me know.
On a more political note, I do not like what our government is doing. I'm generally a pacifist to begin with, but I clamor for peace even more vehemently when I see an administration using war as a red herring to advance their own agenda. Namely, the Republicans in our government are attempting to whittle away our rights as private citizens of America. With legislation like the Patriot Act, Homeland Security, etc., I'm frightened that civil liberties and personal privacy are set to vanish. Besides that, this administration has allowed abuses of the environment as well. From what I've heard, they've opened up hunting in some national parks. Hunting! No one cares, however, because the only issue being focused on right now is the war with Iraq. This is so depressing. (BTW, if I am wrong in any of my information, please feel free to verbally bitch-slap me across the face ... or send me to a reliable source where I can find out the truth. I will apologize where wrong, and print correct information as I learn it.)
Quick question: Is there anybody out there who likes Bush right now? (I mean actually likes and supports what he's doing fully, and is willing to defend him as an intelligent and moral leader. Most "supporters" I know seem to be of the opinion that what he and his administration are doing is a necessary evil, but they are uncomfortable with the situation.) I keep hearing these polls about how the majority of the population are backing Bush and want him to continue as he has been acting. Personally, I think they are reprinting the statistics from November 2001 and claiming that they're new. The Internet Community sure seems ticked off. For every site in praise of his politics I can find half a dozen more that decry our government's abuses of power and it's idiotic tactlessness in diplomatic strategy. None of the people I talk to on campus support Bush (myself included). Everyone here enjoys making fun of his idiocy, and no one trusts his judgement. People who regularly keep up with politics are the most incensed. So, will Bush be re-elected in 2004? For the sake of myself, the nation, and the world, I pray he is a single-term president.
I have other stuff I want to write about, but not the time at the moment. Must go get some class stuff done. Bya!
Hmmm, not too much going on in particular. A few days ago I was an idiot and locked myself out of the room. There were no RAs to be found, but a cleaning lady came by and she helped me in. Very nice lady, very southern voice, her name is Miss Cleo (no relation to the Jamacian fortune faker).
My family got to visit last weekend (minus Carly). It was fun. My sister Erica spent the night here, and we played Kingdom Hearts till the wee hours of the morning. It was nice to see them. It would have been cool if Carly had been here too. Oh, and important news, today is Erica's birthday! Happy 17th Erica!!!!! Love you!!!!
Now I'm heading out to Henderson, Tennessee for the Tennessee Honors Conference. I'll be involved in two presentations. One, a demonstration of critical thinking improv. Basically, we'll be acting out different logical fallacies, and people will have to guess which one each person is. Then, I'm also presenting on how music videos, especially the banned ones, can be very good art. I'll be back tomorrow evening. Should be a fun trip.
So, I just got finished watching "The Last Temptation of Christ", and William Defoe is Jesus! With "Dogma" showing us that Alanis Morrissette is God, this is turning out to be quite the intreguing trinity. I wonder who is going to end up being the Holy Spirit. ;-) Oh yeah, and Viggo Mortensen kicks ass as Lucifer in "Prophecy", so that supernatural entity is permanently taken too.
I added a new heading over to the left: Random News. I intended to put online-articles over there once in awhile, when I find someone especially worthwhile, or especially funny, or especially sadistic ... you know, my usual entertainment ;-).
Not too much going on lately. ... I'm going to do my laundry tonight :-D. Eh, time to eat some snack food and then get to sleep. Too bad I didn't buy any ice cream. I could use a dairy fix right now. Ah well, later.
There was a "successful" suicide attempt on campus this past Thursday. I wasn't close to the guy, but I'd been involved with a few groups and projects with him, so the news was a bit of a jolt. It probably would have bothered me more if I'd actually seen him in the past couple weeks, though. It would have reinforced the dismal lesson of life's transience. I knew that Mike had issues to deal with, and low self esteem, but regarding the specific reason for his final decision, I know nothing. I only know that if anyone I love did this (family member, good friend, etc), I would not be able to handle it. The bottom would promptly drop right out of my little world. There's supposed to be a memorial service of some sort for Mike later this week (I think). I intend to go.
On a happier note, things with conferences are moving along nicely. Classes are fine; my lab instructor for chemistry speaks above a whisper this semester and is very active and helpful in the lab (huge improvement over last semester); not really any drama going on in my life at the moment (although I'm prone to live vicariously through my friends' love lives anyway ;-) ), and other than that things are pretty normal.
Oh oh oh, and Mr. Lancaster (my English teacher for two years of highschool) is supposed to be in a production of Much Ado About Nothing at TPAC. If it's still playing this weekend, I want to go. (They set the play in 1937 America, so now Shakespeare's characters are swing dancing, heheh. Potentially cheesy, but I'm willing to bet it's entertaining.)
Ok, apparently I was mistaken in what I thought was a blue moon. A blue moon is where you have two full moons in a month. Also, a harvest moon is gold/orangish, so it wasn't that either. What moon did I see that night? Hell if I know. Probably just some funky lights reflecting in the atmosphere, but it was pretty and it was rare and I liked it, dammit!
This weekend has been a very nice and needed break. It's been cool just sleeping in and hanging out with everyone. The snow giving us an extra day was especially sweet *grins*. Let's see, what have we done? We've walked to Poets in the snow, watched a few movies, and played a couple games of Trivial Pursuit. (Hey, it's the honors hall. It sure did take us a long time to finish each game though, three hours. Oh, and I suck at the game. There weren't any Shakespeare, mythology, or music video questions!)
That's right, two nights ago there was a blue moon out. I saw it. (At least I think it was a blue moon. Either that or a harvest moon or something.) It was gorgeous. There were several rings of light that gradually shifted colors. Mostly the rings were white or gold, but there was a blue outter ring sometimes too. When the blue ring was there, it looked like the moon was a the pupil of a glowing, celestial eye. As disturbing as a giant eyeball in the sky might sound, I actually found this rather charming.
Oh, found some more music that I like. The group is Mad at Gravity. Their best song is the acoustic version of "Burn". Right now I'm listening to a few of my favorite punk and rock cover songs.
Got the banned books colloquium tonight. Three hours at a shot. Well, I knew I had to do some colloquiums, so at least I got one in a topic I'm trully interested in. (I'm very, very anti-censorship. It should be fun reading all the books the "authority" figures don't want you to get ahold of. Controversy is so much fun!! It's also necessary for a healthy society, imho.)
I am soooooo jealous. I went to visit my highschool yesterday, for the luncheon, and I'm upset. There are two new buildings on campus. (Yes, we refer to it as a campus, not schoolgrounds, because from the interstate Father Ryan looks like a college campus.) One building is a new library. It's finished and is absolutely gorgeous. It's got tons of windows, lots of room, new computers and other techological fun, and I am bitterly jealous. When I attended Ryan, our library was small, dark, cluttered, and had old computers. Grrrr.
The second building makes me salivate even more. It's not finished yet, but by the end of the school year they are going to have a brand new theater. Again, when I was in high school, they held all our plays in the cafeteria. That meant displacing a ton of eating students (and the place was already crowded beyond fire-code safety), a lot of difficult set up work for the crew (they actually had to reassemble the stage for every show), and the actors had no backstage and no dressing rooms. Now, in this perfect work-in-progress that will soon be the new theater building, they have huge dressing rooms, a huge storage area, plenty of room backstage, a very advanced overhead lighting system and more. They even have a room for teaching dance and choreography. That's what really gets me. They're expanding their curriculum to include in depth choreography, set design, costume design, directing, etc. Plus, other places will be renting out the theater too, so they'll get to see presentations and plays and musical performances that never came while I was there. Everything friggin got better right after my class graduated! Plus, all of this is a hundred times better than any facilities we have at Tech. Grrrrrr.
By the way, the room that Amanda and I share, it's sparkling clean and neat right now. For anyone who cares to see this short-lived wonder, drop by the room today or tomorrow. We've decided that we're going to maintain its perfection for at least 24 hours. (Although, I am going to try and be more organized than last semester.)
Oh, and I have to bitch about one thing real quick. Those new chairs that ResLife brought in last semester, they suck. They're big, bulky, and they can't shoved into my closet because they don't fold up. I, like many other people on campus, already have a rolling office chair that I am quite happy with. I really don't care to have the new chairs wasting half the room in my dorm when it's already the smallest living space on the planet. What kind of crack were these people smoking when they ordered non-folding chairs!? Stupid administration, again I am frustrated by their lack of forethought.
Just got back from a week in Wisconsin. The vacation was very nice. Spent a lot of time relaxing with the family, did a lot of reading (some for fun, but mostly for the banned books colloquium I'm taking next semester), watched a few movies, ate some good Italian food, watched that pathetic excuse for a football game between the Packers and the Falcons *sob*, and shopped in Tenuta's.
The coolest part was hanging out with my cousins Sonja and Kyle. We rarely see them because they live in Colorado. It was great fun to see them. Oh, also, they brought this chess set that they got at Toys-R-Us. (Kyle is the chess champion of the 5th grade.) It has the types of moves capable by each piece printed right on the piece, making the game easier to learn. I got to play a couple games with them. I wanted my own immediate family to learn, but they weren't really interested and there wasn't that much time that both families were together. Oh well, still had fun.
Lemme tell you about Tenuta's. It's this family owned Italian grochery where my Grandpa always shops. We always make at least one pit stop there each time we travel up north. All kinds of pastas, cheeses, meats, and herbs of excellent quality. (For people who actually like cooking from scratch. I'm more of a microwave girl myself.) A third of the store (if not more) is devoted to alcohol. Their wine selection is the biggest I've ever seen, and the prices are generally supposed to be good. The best part, though, are all the chocolates. They've got chocolate from all over the world, mostly Europe, and it's all soooooooo good. I bought a couple of bars with different languages on the wrappers, which I plan to tape up on my walls when I get back to the dorm. (I'm weird, I admit it.) My favorite so far is Toberlerone chocolate. It is quite with the yummy.
Oh, and they also have Italian flags and t-shirts and "Parking for Italians Only" signs. (My favorite, though, was "If You Taka My Space, I Breaka You Face". Cheesy, but I like it.)
My plan of attack for the immediate future?: I'm going to catch up with high school buds for the next day and a half, if I can. The alumni luncheon at Father Ryan on Tuesday should be interesting. I plan to go to that. Then, I'm heading back for another semester at Tennessee Tech. I really am expecting less stress this time around. I don't have any weird premonition of excess drama or crap, and that is a very good thing. It should be an enjoyable semester.
It was a very nice holiday this year. Spent Christmas Eve with the family in our usual tradition (although slightly out of order). We walked around the Opryland Hotel then went to Mass at 9:00 (usually we go to Mass first). Afterwards we came home, videotaped ourselves opening presents from each other, drank eggnog, and went to sleep.
We started a tradition of going to the Opryland Hotel on Christmas Eve since our extended family has extended itself so far around the U.S. The holiday is just with the five of us, so to make it more festive (for free) we wander through the hotel, enjoying all the larger-than-life decorations. The dancing water isn't there anymore, which I miss, but they still have live music. There's a rotating restaurant that's very sweet. My sisters and I used to stand with one foot on the moving part and one foot on the stationary ground next to it. Kids like simple stuff.
I have a few memories of giving my parents grief there. Once they thought I was lost when I was just standing in one place, captivated by the dancing water. They were about to have all the doors locked (to make sure I wasn't kidnapped) when they finally spotted my blue cap. Another time, when I was between four and six years old, I was dancing to a live band and fell. The hotel people wanted to call the paramedics. I wasn't even crying. My parents laughed at them and said I was fine. What can I say, I'm a clutz, but I'm a tough clutz.
My favorite part, though, is the waterfall that we walk under. For some reason, it strikes me as romantic to have water falling in front of you off of a giant block of stone balancing above your head. It's a "sweet spot" I guess.
Anyway, for Christmas this year I got Ghostbusters and Death to Smoochy on DVD. (I also recently bought Dogma on DVD.) All great stuff. I also got a black hat, black socks, pjs, a nice suitcase (which I badly needed), a Shakespearian Magnetic Poetry kit, a pretty necklace, a grey scarf and black gloves. (Apparently Santa wasn't big on colors this year ;-). ) I like everything I got, and it seems that everyone else likes what I got them, so all is well. Merry belated Christmas everyone.
The semester is over ... YAY!!!!!!!! Definitely my worst semester academically, but it won't be a repeat. Oh, and promptly after my exams, less than an hour after I finished my last one on Wednesday, I started sneezing. The rest of the cold attacked later that night. Very watery, itchy eyes and a slightly sore throat, plus more sneezing and many many Kleenexes. I guess the focus on classes that I'd had all semester was letting my body forget allergies or something. Like I was too busy and too distracted to stay sick. Heheh, maybe stress is *good* for your health ... naaaaaaaaah. Anyway, I'm home now, feeling much better, and relaxing (mostly). Seems our family bonds mostly over movies. We've already watched the Labyrinth (which, I recently realized, features a labrys in the scene with the giant "robot" puppet ... it makes me smile), Fight Club (which I now own on DVD, yay!!), Men In Black II (funny, but the first one is still better), and Ice Age (predictable kid flick, but cute). Oh, and our tree is up. We still need to decorate it though. Maybe tomorrow night or Thursday night.
I'm working at O'Chuck's again for a couple of weeks (Jebus help me). I've mostly got day shifts, which means I'll be earning less money (smaller tips), but oh well. I'll take what I can get. At least I'll have a little cash next semester again.
Tee hee, I'm watching "Everybody Loves Raymond" right now. Really is a good show. Quite with the funny.
Redesigned the website. The pink was getting too painful. Hope it didn't hurt anyone's eyes this past semester. The green should cause fewer aneurysms ;-).
I can't wait for Wisconsin. We're heading up North again right after Christmas. Going to spend New Years with the family. Plus, there'll probably be snow. (And by snow, I do not mean one of those two inchers that pass for blizzards in Tennessee. No, I mean snow that you can go sledding and skiing in, and that is good for snowmen and snow angels and snow forts. Heheh, the snow forts are the best. Me loves me some wet, mushy, completely non-violent violence.)
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