Overload

I am absolutely exhausted.  I have been running and running this whole week - 2 big exams, 3 papers due, a big home rugby game on Saturday that we're trying to prepare for.

Today has been out of control.  I had a 9am class, and my class at 12 was canceled, thank goodness, or else I wouldn't have had enough time to get so much stuff done.  After class, Em and my co-captain, Tank, went to Walmart, Michaels, and AC Moore to get supplies for the pong table we are constructing for the Rugby House.  It looks amazing!  We painted it blue, and it has gold triangle outlines where the cups go.  I'm about to go make a stencil of our team's symbol for the middle of the table.  

After working on that for a few hours, Em and I came back here to let Sydney out and I had stat homework to complete online.  Luckily, it was about different kinds of experiments (double-blind, simple random sample, etc.)  so it only took me about 20 minutes to complete.  You can submit the homeworks as many times as you want to, before they're due, and so you just receive the highest grade that you got out of all of them.  So I only had to submit it twice before getting a 100%.  I broke a record today!  :-)

Now, I have to work on a bunch of stuff - on our team we have "Bigs & Littles" like at PACAA and in sororities, just so that the new rookies have someone who's taking them under their wing and making sure they're doing okay with everything.  Since I wasn't here last semester, I didn't get one, but now I have one!  It's funny, because my Little's name is Kelsey... so now I have two little sisters named Kelsey!  I find that amusing.  I bought some neat stuff to make for her for the game tomorrow, so that's on my list of things to do.

The team is going out to eat at Oli.ve Gar.den (mmmm!)  tonight, and after that, a friend of mine from freshman year is going to be in town, so we're all getting together and having a party.  I can't party too hard though, because of our big game tomorrow!

I'm pretty excited about the game because we are going off of well known rugby theme or saying - "Give Blood.  Play Rugby."  (Get it?  B/c we bleed a lot on the field...) So, we got the American Red Cross Bloodmobile to come to our game, so that people can come watch the game, and give blood!  We're hosting another game as well (Duke vs. Wake Forest) so there will be plenty of time for people (NOT PLAYERS BEFORE THEY PLAY A GAME) to donate blood.  We're hoping for a big turnout!!  And then a sweet social after the games :D

Summer Plans

I'm currently trying to figure out my plans for this summer.  The last few days, I've been thinking a lot about how much I regret missing THON each year.  The more I thought about this, the more I thought about how I don't want to regret what I do with my summer.  There will only be a few more short years that I have a real job that won't give me 2 or 3 glorious months off.  And then I realized what I would love, more than anything, to do with my summer.

(Can you find Liam in the picture!?  Haha.  God, I miss him!)

I would LOVE to volunteer at a camp for children with cancer.  I mean, they are always, always the coolest kids, with great outlooks and amazing hearts.  Plus, it would be great to get that experience in before I start applying for internships with Child Life programs here in NC.  I loved working at G.S. camp, and of course this would be different, but honestly - not all THAT different.  I mean, kids with cancer are still normal kids for the most part!

Dilemmas: 

-I don't know if it's too late to apply to camps.  I can find this answer out easily, though.

-There aren't many camps in North Carolina...

-So I may as well just go somewhere completely different... right?  There are camps all over!

I'll have to look into this more..

LTLYM and My Bag

LTLYM: #33: Braid someone's hair.

I've never, ever been able to french braid hair.  Ever since I was little, I was amazed when mothers of my friends would braid their hair into beautiful plaits and make it look so easy!  

I braided Em's hair like this the other night, and I think it turned out really well!  Her hair is super thick, and I actually got two hand cramps while doing the braids!  (Kristen = a wimp!)

PS. Em would like me to let everyone know that she was puffing out her cheeks when I took this photo, as in "I'm exasperated with this art homework!"

I've been meaning

 to do this for awhile, but never got around to it--

In My Bag

I actually don't usually carry a purse, but yesterday I had a doctors appointment and had way too much to carry in my coat pockets, so I grabbed the purse I use in times like those (and in the summer when I don't wear a big coat with a million pockets).  The contents:

-Playing cards (for the waiting room for Tri-Peaks Solitaire, my new obsession)

-Tampon

-Chicken Soup for the Soul - The Cancer Book.  Signed and sent to me by a wonderful lady who is an NB mom in North Carolina.  It's for my mom, so I'm going to take it to her next time I go home.

-Or.bit Gum

-Prescription bags from last summer (!?)

-Pen from the restaurant I used to work at

-Bracelet from PACAA

-Green paper clip

-My wallet that is one of my prized possessions

-Pocket Sudoku

-Earrings my uncle gave me for Christmas

-A pink Elephant that, when stood up, holds rings on its trunk.  My mom got it for me as a present.  :-)

There you have it!

Oscars

Last night I watched the Oscars- I missed a few awards in the middle so that I could talk to my mom on the phone and Sky.pe with my sister, but they weren't any awards that I cared too much about, I don't think.

I was super, super excited that Wall.E won Best Animated Feature Film.  If you haven't seen it, you need to ASAP!  It's such a cute movie, I'll admit that I got teary-eyed a few times while watching it.  And I'm usually not a fan of robots, so I didn't have very high expectations for this movie.  But it blew me away- great message, great characters, awesome story line.  And when you fall in love with the song that plays during the closing credits, refer back to here to find out who sings it and what it's called, so that you can download it, because I know you'll want to ;-)  It's Peter Gabriel - Down to Earth.

Slumdog Millionaire swept the awards, winning eight (I think?) Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Director.  I still haven't seen it, but I really want to.  We've been talking about it in my Politics of the Non-Western World class, so I pretty much know the story, but I hear it's just amazing to watch.

Also, Sean Penn won Best Actor for his portrayal of Harvey Milk in Milk, and I was very impressed with his amazing speech.  According to Youtube he "Slams Prop 8, calls Barack 'elegant' "

Amazing!  I have always loved Sean Penn  :-)

Photos from Downtown

Today, Em and I explored downtown GSO and brought our cameras along for the ride.

2/20

Em snapped this photo of me on Valentine's Day ... I'm whisking the hollandaise sauce and telling my mom how much I love her.  :-)   Oh, and I am adding a photo of the amazing salmon we prepared... (before it went in the oven!)

It's just like singing...with your body.

Sometimes I feel like I don't know where I belong... in groups and in life.  Everywhere I go, I make friends with people who are already in a "group".  I am still able to become friends with them, but I'm always too late to become an actual part of the group.  It's been like this my whole life.  I don't know why, it just always feels like I'll never 100% be a part of some group of people.  Every group of friends I have been in, I've been the late comer.  There are already too many stories, the group is already designated by a name or some sort of phrase.  The only group I actually feel that I belong in is my Jr. Staff group at PACAA.  That's kind of different though, because I was chosen to be in that group, and so was everyone else.

I love all of my friends, don't get me wrong.  I'm just tired of being the newcomer.  I just want to know that I belong.  

On to less pathetic-y things...

LTLYM #5. Recreate an object from someone's past.

Em told me a story a long time ago.  She went to a summer camp every summer, and I loved hearing the stories she told me.  (Which eventually led to me working there for one summer in 2007).  One story in particular stuck with me, because I could completely empathize with how she felt....

When Em was 14, she read the book Cure For Death by Lightning.  In it, one of the characters has an anklet with little bells on it.  In passing, she mentioned how cool she thought that was to her mom, and promptly forgot about it.  That summer, she was in a unit with her friends and she noticed that one of her counselors had an anklet with bells, just like the girl from the book.  "How cool!", she thought.  Later that day, after lunch, Em received a package from her mom.  Ironically- her mom had included a bell anklet!  She had remembered how Em had mentioned it, so she saw one and sent it.  Em could barely contain her excitement, and couldn't wait to show her friends.  She ran over to their tent, ducked inside, and prepared to show her friends her cool new piece of jingling jewelry.  Just as she was about to pull it out of her pocket, the girls started snickering.  Em realized that they were making fun of the counselor outside their tent.  "Only DYKES wear bells like that!", one of them exclaimed.  The others agreed, as they all dissolved into giggles.  Em, deflated, shoved the anklet further into her pocket.  She went back to her tent, put the anklet back into the package, and never, ever tied it onto her ankle.  She never spoke about it to anyone.

This story broke my heart.  So I made Em a new set of bells, and she is currently wearing it and jingling everywhere she goes.  :-)

LTLYM #50

Assignment #50. Take a flash photo underneath your bed.

I took a picture under our bed in Em's room (as mine is basically the "guest bedroom" and only has broken down boxes underneath of it).  

Things in this photo: 

-An underneath-the-bed storage tub filled with Em's sweaters.

-Em's safe deposit box (that has barely anything in it!)

-A big backpack

-One of Em's pink fuzzy "princess" slippers.  (hehe)

-The stuffed turtle we bought at the Sea Turtle Hospital on Islamorada in the Keys.  (Notice that his neck is bandaged - they are sooo cool at that place.  It's a must-see if you go to the Keys!!)

-An empty water bottle.

-An ace bandage.

-The tent that Em got me for my birthday!  (The one we set up in the living room and slept in to try it out!!)

LTLYM #32

I came across a website called Learning to Love You More. It's a project where people do "assignments" and turn them in. It's actually been turned into a book, and an art exhibit... and it's quite interesting. I took the list of assignments and altered a few, since a few of them confused me, such as "Illustrate a scene or make an object from Paul Arensmeyer's life story". I tried not to alter them too much.

I did my first assignment tonight: #32. Draw a scene from a movie that made you cry.

The scanner was not agreeing with me tonight, so I had to take a photo of the picture, hence the weird coloring. The scene I drew is from a movie that I watched last night. It's tricky, because the movie is actually a musical. Last night we watched RENT: The Final Performance. It's the last performance of Rent on Broadway at the Nederlander Theatre. The recording is amazing- everything about it is stunning... specifically the camera angles. When I saw Rent on Broadway in September it was the night before this was recorded. Watching this brought back all of the emotion I had from that night, and I was teary-eyed throughout the whole thing! During the last scene, I lost it :-) Mark is showing his documentary that he was making throughout the whole show, which includes actual footage of most of the cast.

I have included the list of tasks on my sidebar, at the bottom. Feel free join me in this adventure and draw a scene from a movie that made YOU cry!

Ouch.

On Friday night we went to the men's rugby game versus University of Tennessee.  It was a good game, and afterwards we hurried back home so that I could do my stat homework that was due online by 11:55.  As I was doing it, I was so proud of myself for actually reading the chapter each week and even taking notes (!!!).  I try to be really responsible and get all of the homework/quizzes done way ahead of time, so that I'm not scrambling at the last minute to turn it in online.  I even thought to myself, "Wow, I'm so on top of this class so far.  This is awesome."

And then something awful happened.  I went to Blackboard and saw an announcement from my professor.  She was letting everyone know that the exams were available to pick up from outside her door, and the answers to the exam were up on Blackboard.  

Oh. My. God.  ....  While worrying about my FIVE other classes, and while I've been worrying about my online homework and online quizzes, I COMPLETELY FORGOT that there were actual exams on campus.  And the first one had been 2 days before...

Well... I burst into tears and freaked out.  How could I pass the class if I missed an entire exam?  There are only four exams, and I already had a zero on the first one.  Not to mention that the first exam is probably the one I'd do the best on, since it was mostly review of things I'd learned in high school.  I cried and cried, and luckily Em had enough sense to find the syllabus for that class, because she found out that the Final Exam score replaces the lowest exam score.  

So, pretty much I am going to have to make sure that I get excellent scores on all of the exams here on out.

I hate myself for being so caught up sometimes that I forget simple things.  I'm also so mad at myself for not being responsible in the beginning of the semester and writing the dates of the on campus exams down.  At least there is a chance that this won't affect my final grade!

Valentine's Day

This morning Em and I slept late and then she got in the bath to relax while I made pink heart-shaped pancakes and pink milk!  (Gotta love red food dye!)  After breakfast, we took our time getting ready and hung around the house for awhile.  Then we met some friends at a Mexican restaurant for Margaritas (and I'm STILL feeling that!).  Then we went grocery shopping... the menu for tonight includes: Lemon Rosemary Salmon with Hollandaise sauce, Cream Cheese Yukon Gold Mashed Pototoes, and Green Beans ... yum!  Oh, and a great Pinot Noir that Em found that gave some of its profits to a dog rescue.  :-)  Happy Valentine's Day!!

Turtle Power!

This is the a capella group at my school...they have a lot of amazing songs on You.tube, but this one had Em and I laughing and yelling about how awesome TV used to be.  See how many shows you can name!

List

1. I just ate an entire sleeve of Saltine Crackers.  Is that disgusting?  

2. Around this time every year, I start to get this creeping feeling... this is around the time when Em and I start to plan our Spring Break.  The last few years we have gone to some great places - Ft. Lauderdale, Miami, The Keys (I miss being there more than anywhere else).  Oh, and plus last year about 2 weeks after Spring Break we went to Arizona for Em's friend's wedding.  This year, we are saving money and not doing anything special.  But, I keep having visions of palm trees, bluish-green water and white sand... ahh.

Key Largo, March 2008.  No, there's not a balloon in my shorts, that's what my butt really looks like.  ;-)

3. My Race and Ethnic Relations class is going really well.  Except for one thing - there is a guy in there who has zero social skills.  And I don't mean that he's one of those people who chooses to be rude, annoying, etc.  I mean, this is a kid who I honestly believe has some sort of issue - he is completely socially inept.  Our teacher was talking about differing perspectives on things and just threw out the example of "How the World Was Created".  The two main theories being the  Big Bang Theory and then the more religious theory about God taking 6 days to create the Earth and resting on the 7th day, etc.  Anyway, the guy who I'm talking about, let's call him Ned.... he raises his hand (as he does about 97 times in a class period) and starts talking about how The Big Bang Theory isn't right, it's impossible because of [insert 5 minutes of crazy geology jargon here].  Ned does this about 4 times a day, and inserts little comments constantly as well.  Everyone in the class gets pretty fed up with him, and I feel bad for him.  But today, someone took it to a new level.  Ned raised his hand to tell my professor how humans are in NO WAY (he also did a huge hand gesture... picture a 3rd base umpire signaling "SAFE!") related to Apes, yadda yadda... and this kid in the back row yells "DUDE JUST LET HER F_CKING TALK!  JUST LET HER DO HER THING!  YOU ARE CONSTANTLY INTERRUPTING HER!"  And the class fell silent, and the professor just turned to Ned and said, "What were you saying?"  I commend her, I would never, ever be able to be as patient as she is with him.

4. I hate watching Animal Planet.  Is that weird?  I feel like that makes me an animal-hater, which isn't the truth at all.  I love my dog, and I (usually) love my cat.  

That's all for now.

Gut-wrenching.

This morning, Em went downstairs and made coffee while I rolled around in bed and "woke up".  She brought the coffee up and we laid in bed and looked at Post.Secret together.  After that, we came across a blog that I haven't stopped thinking about all day long.  Actually, all day long I have had "something in my eye"...as, when I remember it, I can't help but get emotional. 

The blog is here: Matt, Liz, and Madeline.

Matt and his pregnant wife, Liz, were expecting their daughter in the spring of last year.  Madeline came a little early, with her cord wrapped around her neck.  When she was delivered, she was generally okay, and no long term effects were expected.  She was to be in the NICU for a few days, and then let free to go home with her parents.  27 hours after she was born, Madeline's mother Liz unexpectedly and suddenly died of a pulmonary embolism.  Maddy was only a day old, her mom passed away, and suddenly it was just Matt and an infant.

He originally started a blog to keep everyone informed about the pregnancy.  After his wife died, the blog became a way to chronicle his raising of Maddy and what it's like to do it by himself.  He also receives a lot of support from people around the world.  

For a better explanation of what happened, read this: 'Without Liz, but not alone.'

The one thing that broke my heart is, when we were looking at photos of Matt and Maddy, we realized that Matt was wearing Liz's wedding rings on his pinky.  

Photo taken by Gina Lee.

Tragedies occur every day.  We lose people that we love, and it's not fair and it's sad beyond belief and we ask "WHY?" over and over..  But when we figure out how to honor our loved ones and live our lives the way that they would have wanted.. well... I think that is something to be proud of, and something that is completely commendable. 

Also check out the foundation that Matt started in memory of his wife: The Liz Logelin Foundation. 

UNCG 17 - Guilford 10

We played our first rugby game of the season yesterday.  The game was a really good one, and well fought by both sides.  I basically gave the other team a try, it sucked... I was so mad at myself.  We had a scrum right on our own try line, and I was supposed to pass the ball back to our kicker, so she could kick it out of our try zone.  I got mixed up and felt very pressured by the other scrumhalf, (who was actually off-sides).  I went to pass to our kicker and got nervous that it was the wrong person (I should have looked at her first, instead of just the "person" standing there) so I sort of passed to no one, because once I got the ball out, I got nervous and tried at the last second to pass it to who I thought was our kicker, but was actually our flyhalf.  I ended up passing to no one, the ball landed in our try zone, and the other scrumhalf jumped on it, scoring a try for them.  I was so, so angry at myself.  I made up for it later in the game by scoring a try to make up for it.  Still, it was a great game and I am proud of my team for holding it together and playing great defense over and over and over.

The weather the last two days has been amazing.  Yesterday I actually got sunburned at the game, and it was warm enough for shorts and a tshirt.  Today I was so excited to wake up and walk outside to the sun shining, 70 degrees, and a nice 

breeze.  We were supposed to go hiking with our friend Courtney but when I woke up this morning I felt like I'd been run over by a truck.  This is how most of us ruggers feel the morning after an intense game, so I wasn't surprised.  I think we'll go hiking another day, but today we might take Syd to the barkpark and walk around the big park that surrounds it.

Em took some great photos during the game, but she hasn't loaded them yet, so I'll leave you with a few photos of my battle wounds!  The bruises don't look awesome yet, because they're only about  24 hours old... in two days they're going to look great!

Advisors, Statistics, and Photos

My advisor completely screwed me over.  I won't be graduating until next Spring now, and I am beyond frustrated about it!  I did all of my homework- I figured out exactly what classes I needed to graduate, and set up my two last semesters.  I told my advisors what my plan was for my last 2 semesters, and she said it sounded great.  Then, I find out a few days ago that one of the classes that I had planned to take at the same time as my internship (next fall) is actually a prerequisite for my internship.  And now it's too late to switch into it (I tried to get special permission...I was not successful.)  They don't offer the class in the summer, either.  So now, I'm going to have to take that in the fall, with the rest of my classes, and then just do my internship in the spring.  How frustrating is that!?  She apologized, but... I think she should have to pay for my extra semester.  Have any of you ever been screwed over by your advisor?

In better news, I am doing well in my online statistics class.  So far, I have a 95 average!  That's only with two homework assignments and two quizzes, but seriously, that's really good for me!  Soon we'll be getting into things that are harder than histograms and standard deviations though... and then I'll probably need to hire my friend Kim as a tutor, haha.  We'll see!

In the last few days I've learned A LOT more about my camera, which is exciting for me.  I'm able to do a lot more things manually now.  I always knew what things like ISO and aperture would do if I changed them, but I never totally understood why.  Now I do, and I'm able to put it to use!  My photos are still nowhere near what I'm shooting for (one day... one day!) but I feel like I'm actually making progress.  I owe this to this awesome manual I found online, and this really sweet woman who is a professional photographer who found my PAD and has been leaving me little tidbits of advice.  It's almost embarrassing for me to know that she's looking at my photos because they are certainly nothing special, and hers are GORGEOUS.  One day, I hope that I can take photos just like her!  Here is her website if you'd like to check it out.  And if you live in Ohio, book her!  

Parenting

Being a Child & Adolescent Development major, one of the classes I'm taking this semester is "Theories and Principles of Parenting".  Right now we're still going through all of the framework theories on Child Development- something that I've reviewed in every single HDF (Human/Family Development) class I've ever been in.  (Kind of like how in every single science class, you always review the scientific method in the beginning).  

I realized today how beneficial it's going to be for me someday to have taken these classes.  I have learned so much about children and how their minds work.  I feel like I am going to be a better parent one day.  All parents should be required to take these classes!  I don't really believe that... but it would certainly be helpful.  We talk a lot about current events- newspaper articles or things we've seen on the news about parents and horrible things that they've done to their children.  You may have seen on the news recently about the toddler's body that was found in a bin in Galveston Bay down in Texas.  They were calling her "Baby Grace"... they identified the child and her parents (well, mother and mother's boyfriend) and when they were questioned about why they beat their child to death, their answer was that "she didn't say 'please', 'thank you' and 'yes sir' at dinner the night before".  They were trying to teach her respect and manners.  

First of all, the child was 2 years old.  Obviously, I don't need to explain why this is NOT an appropriate way to teach your child manners.  I'm not sure about the mental state of either of the individuals involved, except that they were not abusing any substances at the time of the girl's death.  

I'm trying to keep my opinion out of this post, but I can't help it... it absolutely enrages me that these two people murdered this little girl for this reason.  If they had no real reason for doing it, were just crazy, or didn't like her or just wanted to kill her, or had no reason at all except that they enjoyed hurting her, I think it would be easier for me to read about it... because when people kill for those reasons, it's easier to just shake our heads and say "okay, people who murder their children aren't normal and who knows what was running through their heads".  But, when someone murders their child for something that every single day, parents deal with in an appropriate way (saying "what do you say?" when the child asks for something, giving them rewards or positive reinforcement for showing the appropriate behavior (good manners), etc.) it's just mind-blowing and heart breaking.  I don't know why it's so different for me.  

But - going back to my classes- it would be great if all parents or parents-to-be had access to the kind of information that I have been exposed to.  I understand that for hundreds of years, parents have been parenting and "we all made it", but it can't be denied that this stuff isn't useful and that it could change some parents' beliefs about how to handle their children in different situations.