M-m-music!

Listening to music for hours on end at work is wonderful. I've been introduced to some really good music by Stars, the Postal Service, and so many more artists. I love it when there's such loveliness coming into my ears.

In other news, it's incredibly rainy and windy outside - so much that it turned my umbrella inside-out!

Pumped about life

Spring is has finally arrived and I've been busy enjoying school, work, and free food. I lied about the first two.

Student Body elections are in full swing this week, and in order to get students to vote, they have bribed us with a week full of free food. I thought yesterday was wonderful because they provided pizza, popcorn, soda, and slushies, but today? Today, they gave us the option of free Taco Bell or free Pizza Hut! How amazing it is that people have to go to these lengths to get some votes. I am not complaining. I guess this happens every year. This afternoon, I enjoyed myself at lunch time by consuming pizza and breadsticks (yes, both!) while listening to some pretty good guitar & beat-boxing plus blues-y singing, all in one. Good stuff, I tell ya.

There was also a concert outside after that. I love activities! The bands were pretty decent, too, so that definitely helped keep my levels of joy up very high.

Tomorrow, I imagine there will be another free lunch. I'm saving so much money this week and all I had to do was vote once.

Regarding schoolwork, there will be a test in Psychology and a presentation on Cyrano de Bergerac in French Theatre on Thursday. Friday? We get to discuss our photo documentary projects! Exciting, exciting, exciting!

Also, there are just weeks left until the end of this semester. Tell me why I shouldn't be pumped about life.

Hot Water

Our landlord replaced the old water heater with a new one and we have hot water once again.

In other news, Joe took his car out of the garage and someone egged it after one night.

Cold Water

Thursday night, we discovered that there was hot water leaking from the hot water heater. Friday, our landlord replaced a valve. Today, we discovered that it's leaking from another place. Tomorrow, I hope that we can fix this, so that we can have hot water without extra hot water running. I can't wait to see our water bill. Good thing it's not our house.

Calling All Mac Nerds

I've a bit of a problem: I can't seem to open any Adobe products on my Mac mini. Whenever I double-click on a program icon to open it, the program starts to launch, then I get an error that it's ended abruptly. I tried deleting the user preferences folder, but that didn't work. I also installed the latest OS X updates, no luck there, either. Does anyone know how I can fix this? I'd like to get into Photoshop and dabble with that "Orton effect" for some photos.

Thanks much,
Han

Here's a tissue, sissy pants

I hate that my eyes get warm and well up with tears when I'm too sensitive about certain subjects.

As you may or may not know, I will be taking some courses this summer in order to finish my degree. I will be taking French Civilization II -- Independent Study, and I've been trying very hard to keep up with registering and other details just to make sure nothing disastrous happens to prevent me from graduating. I have asked the professor in charge several times regarding the details of this class, and each time, she's blown me off (without any exaggeration, here) by telling me that: "We can talk about it later," or "E-mail [her] and she can give me more information when she has the time," and today, "Don't talk about it. I don't even want to think about it right now." This struck me like a ton of bricks, especially since the rest of the class was there (minus Lesli) to witness this professional courtesy of hers. You know the best part? I was just starting to tell her that I'd gone to the department secretary and taken care of the registration process when she cut me off with that.

It just made me feel sad. Defeated. How does anyone treat another person like this, especially on a professor-student level? Why do I have to cater to her? Shouldn't she give me two seconds of her time? I have never had a professor treat me so poorly in all of my 17 years of school. Seriously.

Oh, Mac mini...

This little guy has stolen my heart! Unless you're booting it up or recovering from "Sleep" mode, the Mac mini makes absolutely no noise at all. There isn't even a faint purr or hum. My laptop, on the otherhand, is sounding like the fans of a house in Vietnam on a hot day.

I wasn't sure how I would get my files from the laptop to the Mac mini, but last night, this little guy proved to me that he is all that and a bag of chips. Thanks to Airport, which was built in, I was able to connect to my existing network and pull my files from the laptop. The bookmarks, photos, contacts, and now, the mail is on its way over to a much prettier place. Gotta love technology.

Highlights, lowlights

The first day back from Spring Break was pretty wonderful, with much thanks to the 70-degree weather and the sun smiling down on us the entire day.

I started to drift off in Psychology, so I stopped by Higher Grounds to get a medium-sized Chai that almost cost as much as an entire meal at Chung King. I felt terribly guilty afterward for spending that much money on a drink--especially one that was merely sub-par, but I comforted myself with the fact that I usually only spend a dollar at the vending machine when I need to, or I make myself some tea at home. Since we don't have ice, I made some tonight and put it in the fridge for the morning. It's amazing how we grow up without ever realizing it.

When you get to college, there aren't that many highlights of coming back from break. You can usually see your friends outside of school (should you want to) and there isn't anything exciting going on when you get there. No more field trips after middle school. Sad, but true. Sorry, kids.

Linguistics was bearable, except for the part when a girl in front of us let her shirt ride up and revealed to us about five whole inches of her crack. I'm not even exaggerating. Ask Emily. Not okay. Why did that even happen?

Highlight of the Foreign Language Lab: getting distracted and going on trips to different buildings with Emily and Jake

I didn't do such a terrible job on my French exam. I may still be able to get that A!

Best Day Ever

• successful Asian grocery shopping trip with Truc (and BONUS: his ridiculously cute little nephew)
• quail eggs for the photography project
• work! I got to work!
• finding out that it's okay to listen to music, browse MySpace, check personal e-mail, and do pretty much anything at work
• we get our own cubes!
• receiving the best e-mail ever, from Joe's Mom:
  
• If you and Joe would like my MAC Mini - you can have it. I'd like to keep the mouse but you can take the [19"] monitor and keyboard.
  
• the aforementioned had me giddy and high on life for the rest of the night
• Flat Top Grill--everyone but Greg came! The Bringer had just come back from his trip in Tennessee, and even Chan was there!
• 2-minute wait to seat 9 people; pretty impressive!
  
• pad thai recipe = best eating experience ever
• flat bread...mmm!
• 300 was so entertaining! It's amazing how they carried their apples back then.
  

VideoJug is the Best Thing Ever

I think I've become addicted to VideoJug. You mean I can watch instructional videos on pretty much any topic for FREE? So far, I've already learned:

• How to Keep the Television Dust-Free
• How to Clean the Kitchen Floor (I love this because of the cute old man!)
• How to Make Naan Bread (Mmm...)
• How to Make Hot and Sour Soup
• How to Clean a Door Mat the Right Way

It's amazing!

Two Hours Later

I'm still awake because that extra strong (2 pouches), chilled Chai latté is finally working. I've been trying to find a good place to put my Google Adsense ads, and I think I've found it. I don't know why I'm bothering since I'll be changing the layout soon. It just seemed like the fun thing to do this early in the morning.

Good things:

• Monthly Newsletters by Heather Armstrong. I look forward to them every month and they never disappoint. Every time I hear a new story about Leta, I want to have a baby right then and there. <-- If that's not a sign that I'm ready to nest, I don't know what is.
• Poker nights with the guys (and sometimes Holly). I look forward to this exciting event every Wednesday. Most of the time, Paul and I are bickering because he's pushing my buttons and I don't want to deal with him anymore--but the rest of that time is quite enjoyable, and I've begun to actually win back the money I put in.
• All-you-can-eat Fridays. This is a new "tradition," and I love it. Last week, we spent hours at a Chinese Buffet laughing over crab legs.
• Spring Break. I'm glad I didn't go anywhere. I've had time to power clean our house, and maybe tomorrow, I'll do my homework.
• The animals. They're so darn cute. Wherever I am, there they are. They all squeeze on the sofa with me when I'm watching TV and they sleep at my feet when I'm at my desk. Sure, they'll come in from the backyard sometimes covered with mud, have accidents (only Ira does this), and whine for silly things, but their cuteness definitely trumps their faults.
• Routines. I would be out of my mind if I didn't have any.
• Empty sinks! I've washed so many dishes, but my work is well worth it. I am a dishwasher.
• Home-cooked meals. My favorite source for recipes is AllRecipes.com. Yesterday, I made Hot & Spicy Tofu. It was delicious! I felt like I'd made a fancy Thai dish. Today, I made Fish Fillets Italiano for Joe, and he told me he liked it. This is better than the usual "it's alright," so I think I did well. It didn't fill us up very well, though--we were hungry about an hour later. Thankfully, we were saved by Giff, who brought us leftover pizza from his meeting at work.
• Sleep. Spring Break has brought it back to me. I think I'll miss it next week, but I'm glad that I got to catch up these past few days. I don't remember when I last woke up at noon. It's nice!
• Emily's not dead! She just had a hair emergency. I hope I'll get to see her tomorrow.

Mumbo Jumbo

We just finished our weekly Poker game not too long ago and I'm exhausted, but I thought I would share some neat things with you.

• Joe's Mom just sent me an e-mail to announce that her MacBook Pro just came today (as you may imagine, I am beyond jealous)
• I was searching for some recipes today and I stumbled upon an instructional video for cooking a Thai breakfast on VideoJug
• Plans are coming together for Joe's birthday!
• His present is due to arrive on Friday
  
• Truc and I are collaborating to make delicious Vietnamese dishes: Lau Thai (a seafood hotpot served with vermicelli noodles) and Crab & Asparagus soup
• I will also attempt to make: cream puffs, snicker doodles, a yummy cake
• I convinced everyone that we should eat at Flat Top Grill on Friday, and we're going to see 300 afterward

I've been putting my Spring Break to good use. Do you know what I did last night while Joe did his paperwork? I cleaned--a lot. I scrubbed the grout between the tiles in the bathroom. I removed the gunk from the sides of our bathtub. I went on a cleaning frenzy. I think that Monk is having an effect on me. I can't believe he got beat up in the last episode! How sad is that?

My training session on Tuesday for the job at school was very entertaining because my boss obsessed over his craving for a Big Mac the entire time. Randomly, he would announce, "Ooh! A Big Mac sounds so good right now..." or "Man, I want that Big Mac so bad!" and so on and so forth. I hope he got his Big Mac. I'll ask him about it next time. Speaking of the training session, we (one of the guys and I) got to see our "office." We're going to be working on laptops, which seemed strange to me, but I'm used to working on one anyway, so it doesn't matter. The boss cracked me up again because he got red staplers for us specifically to reference Office Space. I guess the office has been nicknamed "The Hole," because yeah... it's in the basement, behind some doors, and in the most hidden place I've seen on campus. I don't mind being a hermit, though.

High School Days

This weekend brought us back to high school days. Hungry and determined, the five of us piled into my Yaris and braved the icy roads. It was terrifying. Sure, it wasn't anything like what they had in Versoix, Switzerland:
...but it was still pretty dangerous--so dangerous that while we were eating and laughing our heads off, Truc and Giff noticed some sirens at the intersection just before the entrance to IHOP. "Is that a red truck sitting on the median? Yes, it is..." and then Greg called to let us know that he it was him. He slid while turning and he jumped the median, then hit a guy who was just trying to eat some chicken while waiting in the turn lane.

We told Greg that we'd give him a ride home, and after an hour or so, we piled six people into a tiny Toyota Yaris. I was the one sitting on the floor, being held up by some legs nearby.

Spring Break

It just recently dawned on me that today is the first day of my Spring Break. While everyone else will be in Tennessee or Florida, I will be here. I'm not sad! I do have to be at work for Holly at 5am, but I'm not sad. Why? I have a whole week to relax, not worry, and start working my butt off for the job at school. I got hired a month ago, but we'll finally start working after Tuesday. Hooray for progress!

For the time being, I need to mess around for another hour, then:

• go to the store to get Joe some Band-Aids
• do some laundry, and fold the mountain I've already done
• dishes

Do these things ever stop? Ugh. Life is good.

Getting Fresh with Sara Snow

Still watching Discovery Health and Get Fresh with Sara Snow is my new favorite show. She helps you learn how to "go green" in the office and at home, and also gives advice on healthy eating...all that while remaining a pretty tolerable host!

• What? Clothes made out of bamboo, which re-grows?
• Organic cotton?

Some of her advice is common sense, we just choose to ignore it. She helped a guy clean out his work area by buying him a giant bottle of ketchup and gave him silverware to re-use so that he wouldn't create more waste. What I did find interesting and that I never really thought about was how much energy goes into making the simple things we use everyday. Oh, and of course, she spoke about paper and recycling.

I'm adding her series to my DVR!

No Ricin for Me, Thank You

I just watched a really shocking episode of Diagnosis: Unknown on Discovery Health. A man ("Mike") kept getting sick and his doctors didn't know why. This happens when he goes home, it stops when he goes to the hospital, so on and so forth for a while. Then, one day, he finds some Castor bean seeds and Chemotherapy medicine in his wife's bag. It turned out that she was poisoning him with those seeds, which contain Ricin, a very potent plant toxin. Not only did she try to kill him, she set fire to their house after he moved out (they were going through a divorce) and killed 2 of their 3 kids! Now if that's not a crazy story, I don't know what is.

Whoops!

I'm sorry that I was messing around this afternoon and left a really ugly layout up (something was wrong with the code) for more than 10 seconds.

Other than that, today was pretty decent. Here are some highlights:

• I've already shot my photography assignment for Friday. I drove around for 30+ minutes to look for a good spot, then I couldn't stop at those good spots...so I remembered that duh, there's a cool park about 5 minutes away from our house.
• Before that, I stopped at the train tracks by my old house and took some photos, but I didn't last long because I couldn't find my gloves (I'd just washed them) and my fingers were going to fall off any minute. I went all out--I even brought my tripod. I released the hold on my camera attachment, then I wanted to use it...well, anyway, I dropped my camera in the dirt and there was gunk everywhere. I tried to wipe it off, but then I got it all over my fingers. What did I do? I drove home to wash the dirt off of everything and I found my gloves. I don't think I could've done it without them!
• Franke Park provided me with tons of photo opportunities. I walked through goose poo, dirty snow, and ice to get my photos! I thought that I would slip off the icy steps that led up the bridge, fall into the little stream, and die, but luckily, I didn't. I found an area where the snow was still pure and white--nothing had been touched, really, and there were only a few footsteps. It was quite wonderful!
• I didn't want any buildings to show up in the photos, so I decided to go deeper into the park, to the hill in the back where Holly led us one winter for sledding...it was nice and empty. I finished my roll there.
• On my way out of the back parts, I saw a young couple (high school-age) who kept staring at me as I drove by...probably because they didn't think anyone would venture into such a remote part of the park in the dead of winter...and probably also because they thought they were being caught for doing some naughty stuff. Ah, kids. It was funny, because they pretended to be gazing at the wonders of the BMX park as I drove toward them, but as soon as I drove away (I looked in my side mirror) they were already holding each other (again).
• Oh, the best part is that it took only 30 minutes to develop my film and scan my negatives!
  
• $0.97 half gallon cartons of juice at Wal-Mart
• I won $11 at poker tonight! I was just hanging out, then a pair of Kings accelerated me to that much. Hooray for good poker nights! All of my proceeds will go to Joe because that's what you do when you love someone.
• The Bringer fell asleep on our sofa. It was cute to watch.
• Talks about the Rock, Paper, Scissors Tournament in all the bars around town (especially when they come from The Bringer)
• Sleep. I need some of that now.

How was your day?