give me just one reason why I should stay

11:00am...sitting in the library.
Thursday was a tornado of running around Madison, packing, going to classes, getting my car, giving an oral presentation, picking up flowers, driving against time while prettying myself for a surprise for my mom. My mom's birthday was Friday. The surprise was successful. It was nice to be home, especially when I was sick. Tested negative for strep throat but this supposed mixture of allergies and cold diagnosis is horse manure. I'm about 5 seconds away from ripping my tonsils from my throat. Anywhooo, My third Mifflin St. Block Party and my first absolutely spankin sober one. I held strong all day. Pretty proud of myself. Still feel like crap.
Time to whip out one last Experimental Psych paper. My heart just fluttered a bit in joy...or an anxiety attack. Whatever.

Said this whole world is gonna shut down without me

The greatness of Austin really can't be done justice in a mere blog. I will be putting pictures up at my convenience and perhaps they will show it a bit better. Suffice it to say that it was incredibly fun and I'm certainly a fan.

Coming home to news of the bombings in Dahab were sobering though. Unbelievable. Dahab is probably one place I fell in love with at first site, a place I would go to again before other unchartered territory. I don't think I could understand these acts no matter what, but they are particularly unbelievable in a place like Dahab.

One day and One week of classes left. That time is filled with two oral presentations, one final draft of my paper for Experimental Psych (we have to hand in so many things that we were told to get a 3-ring binder or expanding file to hand everything in...sweet) and a marketing final. Plus preparing for finals week. Well la di da. Mifflin on Saturday will be certainly toned down in order to keep my studious powers flowing and curtail the slight sickness that's dancing on my horizons. Hello Wal-borne (That's the Walgreens brand of Airborne...hopefully my savior).

In less than 24 hours, Ali and I will step off a plane to join Johnny and Adam in the San Antonio airport. The adventure begins there...perhaps it begins when I try to pass off my shisha bag as a purse on the plane.

To make me wanna live like I wanna live now

I received final approval on my experimental materials this morning, which means I can start running participants through my experiment. Which means I had to print out my material packet, four pages per person that I planned on running. Approximately 240 pages total. Plus two articles I had to print out. I began printing at 10:30 am. I finished at about 5:45 pm.

Obviously I have the best printer ever.

I now have to finish my rough draft lab write up by tomorrow evening, thank goodness for extensions (of one day)...(when I have classes all day) and run all my participants if not more by 3:45 pm Thursday afternoon. I know we're all excited for that day to come and me to once again write blogs that are not centered around me complaining.

by the way, the spell check function does not recognize the word 'blog'...weird.

So needless to say I'm odds and ends

There is nothing like warm weather to put the kids in a frenzy. I feel like I haven't slept in days, weeks, months even. My apartment is loud to begin with. It's at a nexus in the city where bars and shopping and eating and taxis and ambulances and fire trucks and frat boys collide. So I don't generally sleep through a weekend night to begin with, a week night if I'm lucky. Usually I'll only get woken up once or twice and no trouble with the actual falling into sleep process. The warm weather brings out the crazies though. Which makes them louder, more obnoxious and at all hours of the night and morning. It also forces my windows ajar because it's hot as an oven even with the slight breeze they provide, the idea of them being shut makes me sweat. Apparently I underestimated the sound buffer my meek windows provided. So sleep is interrupted about once an hour, if not more, and uneven screams jarring the night air added to the increased noise level means that falling asleep has never been more difficult for me. This all has combined to leave me with nerves frayed, and muscles tweaked. I wouldn't suggest looking at me the wrong way, I might burst into tears.

And if you win you get this shiny fiddle made of gold

After a fantastic 24-hour visit from the parents filled with good food and good laughs, it's back to the library. The sun is calling my name but my experimental psychology paper is claiming ownership of my soul.

There's a freeway runnin' through the yard

I walk into the lecture hall for my 9:30 class and find a whole 4 people sitting there. I look to the clock and note the 9:27 time and ponder how Holy Thursday has affected attendance so dramatically. Taking a seat, another student comes in the door and yells, "It's cancelled, she sent an email last night."

Lack of internet strikes again.

So in a day that is usually jam packed with scholarly goodness, I'm lounging about until 1:00 and my first class of the day. After catching up with nomadlife and talking to Grace's Dad on the phone, I'm about to hit the books and be productive. My parents are coming tomorrow. I need to clean my apartment.

I'm dreamin my life away

Just danced through my last exam before finals in 30 minutes flat. No idea how I did, but it's over. Dreaming of going home and sleeping, as my previous ambitions of it not being an all-nighter were held true only by a few squallid blinks of the eyes. Those dreams must wait for the study schedule is weeping and a sleep schedule is of upmost importance at this juncture. Hello Latte.

On this perfect day

Sometimes being a psychology student can make a person crazy...or think everyone around them is crazy. Abnormal psychology test tomorrow on various personality disorders, eating disorders, suicide and mood disorders. Things that just make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. Or make you look at acquaintences and wonder if they are part of the 2% of adults with histrionic personality disorder. I have some suspicions. Either way, studying is directly on schedule and an all-nighter should not be necessary...which is awesome.

If I have to watch any part of Legally Blonde while giving plasma again, I might just vomit, or buy a tiny dog, wear all pink and speak in a squeaky voice. Katie, I'm going to need some tips on bringing out the high voice if I choose option II.

The weather was beautiful today. The thing with weather in Wisconsin is that people tend to take advantage of it a bit more than other places...because we know it could snow tomorrow. Seriously.

Heaven on earth with an onion slice

This has been a fantastic weekend. I haven't laughed this hard or had so many interesting conversations in a while. A chill Friday night, Stones conference on Saturday, dinner at King of falafel with Katy and going out with Ali and Kevin...

So I ended up sleeping at Ali's and I wake up at 8:00Am and decide to head on home. I'm in a bit of a daze, perhaps better classified as a stupor, when a nice young man wearing an apron sticks a menu in my face and says
"Hey, Fuddruckers is giving away free breakfast, anything you want."
My head whips around and I look at him with with bedazzled eyes "Are you serious!?!" I shriek.
Laughing he goes on, "yeah...they have coffee there too."
"You are awesome" I sigh with astonishment in my voice.

And I go on to enjoy a lovely breakfast sandwich, coffee and the worst hash browns I have ever tasted...and call a handful of people (it is 8:30 in the morning) to tell them about the free breakfast. Katie was the only one that picked up. Katie was less than happy with me.

Lunch at the brand-spankin new Fuddruckers was supposed to be VIP only...only if you contributed money to help it get started. When Ali responded that she was planning on spending lots of money there, the 'bouncer' smiled, shrugged and opened the door to a world of free greasiness. I think my heart will stop in about 5 minutes.

But everybody told me to be smart

In a fit of freaking out after getting two exams back that were less than quality...I think using the word quality in the same sentence as the two exam reference might be immoral in some way. Actually using complete sentences with more than one syllable words might be showing more intelligence than I showed on those tests...anyway, while freaking out about these tests and realizing how well I will now have to do on the finals of pretty much all of my classes, I decide to make a plan, a schedule. Whipping out a piece of paper, a pen, and (after quite a lot of digging through papers) all of my syllabi, I decide to create a study schedule. After mashing these together on a calendar format, my breathing deepened, pulse slowed and I smiled. Realizing how much time I actually have to do all of these things definitely eases my mind. Realizing the long weekend in Austin will not really throw me off the schedule at all is fantastic. That is, if I keep to the schedule...I hate schedules, surprisingly.

By the way, turkey brats can taste just as good as the real thing if boiled in beer with onions, then grilled, toasted buns and brown mustard...awesome. Just in case you were wondering...

I think of all the friends I've known

As I was sitting at the coffee shop last night, thinking about trekking home to make some dinner, cachai's started flowing from the next table...my ears and interest piqued, I lean over slightly, unnoticably, in my chair, straining to decipher the waterfall of Spanish soaring through the air. Suddenly there's a fome followed by two quick claro po's and chachai's flying in every direction. Chileans...definitely Chileans. I became visibly giddy, but as the internet trudged along, slowing my struggle to blog it, and my stomach grumbled over its emptiness, las chilenas left, putting a stamp on my scowl.

I feel really out of the loop without internet right now. Que lata.

In other news, when I arrived for a meeting with me TA today, she was crying...it was one of the most uncomfortable experiences I've had yet. One of the guys at the plasma center found out I studied in Chile, and now speaks Spanish to me at every opportunity. Awesome.

I can't control my fingers I can't control my toes

Tensions are running high for me right now. I will not even think about pretending that I have as many reasons to be stressed as Ali, or even Katie, or probably even you reading this right now. Whatever, still stressed. This is compounded by the slowness of the internet at the coffee shop I'm currently at and the fact that I can't go home and go on my own internet...because I cancelled it. My financially saavy parents are probably a little freaked out that I have turned to selling plasma and blog advertisements until I can relax in the earnings of my summer job, but I blame them slightly for my love of travelling and good food, which has no doubt been the largest factor of my usually stable funds' current seizuring. Although I don't think I got my affinity for spontaneous plane ticket bookings from them. Side note: My dad's work has him and my mom on a plane currently headed to Milan (I think?) then Prague, while my sister is on a work trip that has her hopping to a different South American country pretty much every day. Jealous? yes I am...

That aside, it's a fantastic day and after looking through a few pictures for the link of my parents, good moods are shining a bit brighter too. Plus a window seat at the coffee shop is great. I have to register tomorrow and don't really have much of an idea of what I'll be taking. Registration is followed by a meeting with my experimental psych TA. I'm supposed to have my experiment and materials all planned out and ready to go. I'm screwed.

I watched Real Women Have Curves last night for a study break...extended study break. My abnormal psych class is currently studying eating disorders. Interesting mix of stimuli...great movie.

But I know when you have some thing on your mind

How many posts can I begin "So I'm sitting at the library..."? ...

So I'm sitting at the library with Katie, Katy and Adam, who let's call KayT at this point to make it crazier and I'm slightly celebrating my week of nothingness. Nothingness meaning nothing due. And by nothing due I just mean I don't have any more tests or papers due. I do however have a lab due and a meeting with my TA on Wednesday about my experiment...which I'm supposed to have pretty well planned out. Crap. There goes the celebrating. I do however have a crisp $20 bill from plasma donating warming my pocket which will go to some fantastic times. Or maybe half a tank of gas. Whatever.

I actually enjoy giving plasma. Kind of sick. But an hour and a half of studying and watching movies is pretty nice. Especially since today we watched Old School and last week Empire Records. Seriously, what a fantastic little break in my day. The weird part is the pre-donating though. First of all, you get all your vitals taken, weight measured, finger pricked and questions asked. This is the kind of embarrassing part. Because it is always guys doing this part. And guys my age (or maybe younger as Katie found out...). It's just an odd situation having a guy that hypothetically could hit on you at the bar (or while he's pricking your finger as Katie also found out) asking you if you "have had sex with a man who has had sex with a man since 1977" and other such questions and what meds you're on and telling you how much you weigh twice a week. And having a guy I went to middle school with taking a needle out of my arm is kind of strange too. Oh well though...

Keeping an eye on the world going by my window

There are no open outlets to plug my computer into at the library. That is just plain ridiculous. Trying to study marketing for my test tomorrow is not very easy. Last night Katie and I decided to have a cosmo night. Actually it was a cosmo night until we went to the bars...where it became a shot night...which actually probably was a good thing as 3 shots is much less than we would have drank had we ordered proper mixed drinks. Anywho, waking up this morning was a bit difficult, then remembering daylight savings put an even bigger cramp in my style. The only consolation is how much worse my situation could be had I gone to Casino Night...hope those kids get home in one piece, sounds like it was a doozy. Yep, I said doozy. Back to marketing. (This entry took my about 20 minutes to write. Wow)