Belated.

My poor, neglected blog. And I don't have a really good excuse for it either. Unless of course you count the "me not having the internet" thing. I haven't yet figured out how to steal it from the neighbors. Usually I have some access on my on weeks of work, and I have access at school when I'm there, but when I'm there I'm in class, and once I'm home I don't want to walk back there just for the internet, even if it is only a couple of blocks. Anyway, enough excuses.

Thursday my car died again. I figured it might be because it was out of gas, but gas didn't seem to change much. Fortunately school is close enough to walk to, so the only real inconvenience was that I couldn't go to the gym, which I didn't particularly want to do anyways. And I only had two classes; one a lecture for my lab, which I won't even have next week, and the other Institute. So Sheidi gave me a ride home from Institute, and then the deep cleaning of my house began. My roommates and I deep cleaned our house by the way. It's an old house, and it really needed it; plus our landlord was cutting our rent by 200 bucks this month to do it, so we're practically paying nothing. I think the best method of going about it would have involved gasoline and matches though. It needs to be repainted at the very least.

Wednesday I made it through my 3rd Organic Chemistry lab. Man do I hate that lab. My TA for it is so lax it makes me nervous. I seriously get anxiety every time I go, and then my roommate, who is my lab partner, gets anxiety from me. I leave thinking, "shouldn't volumes matter in chemistry?" My TA doesn't seem to think so. Personally I think he's building a false sense of security, telling us not to worry so much about strictly following procedures, and he's really just weeding out A's from the B's. You really can't get lower than that in a lab, but even if everyone deserved an A they can only give out a set number of them, so everyone else is stuck with B's. I really hate labs. I never know what I'm doing, and they won't let you fully know until after you've done the experiment, written up a conclusion for that experiment, and have then taken a quiz on the experiment. Then they clue you in to why it worked and what the point was. So I've pretty much challenged my TA on everything he's ever said. I want to understand what I'm doing. He seems to want us to stand on our own feet, which is good, but I for one need some kind of guidance before I can become comfortable enough to do that. Roommate #1, who is my lab partner, keeps hissing, "he's going to fail you if you keep being so confrontational," but I don't think that's true. He knows I'm smart, and the thing about nice people like her is that they think everyone is insulted by other people being rude to them. Not true. Some people can take it. I personally try not to be purposefully rude unless I know someone can handle it, and Brian deserves it more than most.

I guess I should relate my first lab experience now. Not too surprisingly to those I know, I'm pretty anal in a lot of ways (a random waiter gave me the nickname "anal annie"), and a total perfectionist on top of that. So I have 2 lab parnters: #1 and Mr. Cynical. Which meant that there wasn't much for me to do, because the two of them covered most of it; and so I mainly loomed about and questioned everything they did. I did catch a few errors. Apparently my roommate and I are like "the odd couple," according to Mr. Cynical that is. And I give her anxiety, as was aforementioned. Anyway, I mainly took this lab at this time just because I knew I had to have a lab partner for it, and with my roommate taking it and her threatening me that I had to take it as well so I could be her lab partner...well, I kind of figured I'd have a lab partner. We randomly picked up Mr. Cynical our first lab because he had no one, and we didn't mind having another person. Personally I think he was hitting on #1 a little, and for some reason my drawer is the other isle, while his is next to hers, so that's the real reason we ended up with him. He asked if she had a lab partner, and she did, but she said he could join us. So if you couldn't guess by his name, he's a total punk, but that's not to say I dislike him. It's just always interesting when I meet someone as cynical as myself. He was trying to be frustrating, but I don't mind people like that, because I'm kind of one my self sometimes. I can be a smart alec. Anyway, Mr. Cynical doesn't want to get married, and he thinks you can turn love off, so you can stop feelings towards someone if you don't want to feel them. Funny how adamently #1 fought him on that, considering she didn't believe in love either until she met her fiance, and now suddenly everything's coming up roses. I think I can specifically remember a group of friends having a conversation very similar to the one I witnessed in my lab, but over fondue, and her arguments were very similar to his, only not against marriage, just the idea of love.

Right, so I think there's too much socializing in there and not enough science. Actually I rescind that statement; there's plenty of science, but not enough understanding. And that is my lab so far. The lab that I don't actually need to be taking. Oh, that kills me still. Just one more stress to throw on top of the pile, in the middle of the week when I have other things to divide my attentions between. My next post will be less depressing.

Posting For The Sake Of Posting.

I guess it's been long enough.

Let's see...following up on past events...I sadly never got to go to the Indian or the Brazilian Festivals. That was the day the weather chose to be crappy. I don't so much like this cold, drizzly weather. And I really don't look forward to defrosting my car at 3 am once the winter wears on. You see, I just remembered, which in the gap of years since I first drove EVE I managed to forget, that she totally doesn't have the back window defrosters. I guess she's too old of a car to have the heating wires built into the glass. Yuck. Anyway, even though it was kind of chilly and windy throughout the day, certain patches of it were nice. I didn't really want to drive all the way down to Provo to find myself stuck in a bad patch, especially with a time limit to get back for the wedding, so right after we decided to scrap the idea I was driving back to So Jo and noticed that at the building next to the library there was a Mexican Festival going on. I called Sheidi, who I was going to go to the other two with, and we ended up randomly going to that one instead. I really just like authentic food from different cultures, regardless of the origin. The smothered burrito I had was very good, but I later wished I had gotten the steak tacos the family next to me had. The churros were absolutely amazing, and incredibly filling. Not your standard bowling alley variety. I also got pineapple juice, which is my favorite juice ever, but is usually hard to find. This particular selection contained more sugar than an ant colony ravaging a stash of cinnamon rolls. I am a firm believer that there is no such thing as "too sweet," so I was happy.

I then ended up going to get some holds of mine from the library, and followed that up by buying a wedding present at Target with my sister and the twins for this wedding. I also bought a David Bowie shirt, which I love more than I can express in words.

The wedding was weird, let me just say. It was an actual wedding, and so it was different from any other I've seen to this point, including those of my two older sister's which were also actual weddings. Okay, that sounded totally retarded. I meant that they were not temple marriages, but the standard ceremony everyone outside of Utah thinks of when you mention a wedding; I didn't mean to imply that a temple wedding wasn't an actual wedding, which would mean we're all in trouble otherwise. I mean, it was nice, but just different. The bishop who married them was giving them advice while doing the whole vow ceremony, and it totally reminded me of a Sunday talk, complete with little bits of humor and stories, which made it last forever and perplexed me ever so slightly. The reception was more like a barbecue, which I was totally for, and I managed to not do a lot of homework that weekend, along with losing my 30+ dollar O Chem Lab book. I still have no idea where it could have gone.

So right now I'm a little bit exhausted. I'm at work and I just had a highly pleasant Saturday night, which followed an excellent Friday night--neither of which included all that much sleep, if any. I can't wait till tomorrow, when I start my off week, and I guess I'll probably write about the previous nights then? We'll see, but I definitely am too tired to undertake that now.

To Whom It May Concern

So I made up a new blog. Mainly just because I could. I guess I plan on writing in it more often than this one? Probably more writing, shorter posts. I can’t promise anything when it comes to the subject matter though. Perhaps more of my thoughts and less of my dramatic stories? I always start out with short stories, and embellish till I have a novel. Not that my embellishments are embellishments in the sense that they’re not true, just more information than I strictly need to supply. Anyway, I was looking at my profile and the title and such for this blog, which I don’t really ever do even though they’re never not there, and it just reminded me that what I originally planned for this blog and what I ended up with are two very different things. So we’ll see where I end up. Here it is:

http://notthefirstone.blogspot.com

Genetics Is Eating My Lunch.

I guess it's time for a new post. As always I have things I could write, and no time whatsoever to write them. Well, I shouldn't say that, because obviously I'm writing, but that's more to keep myself from killing myself over Genetics right now than anything else. Basically I can't write anything substantial till after Friday, which is when my test is.

A while ago a friend of mine from work, Boy Sarcastic--who incidentally is possibly one of my favorite people to have worked with ever, asked me about my classes. I told him I was taking Genetics, and he replied, "Genetics; man, that class ate my lunch." He's a smart guy, he went into the degree I'm going into, and so understandably that statement worried and disturbed me ever so slightly. Genetics is currently making its way down the street with my ham sandwich.

Anyway, my second test is on Friday. I did okay on the first test, but not spectacular. There are 7 altogether, and I can drop 2 I think, one of which I think will be dropped after this Friday. I'm really not all that prepared for this test. I've studied, but not as much as I should have, and I'm not feeling as comfortable with this information as I did for the last one. A lot of that is that I've been worrying about the post-lab for my O Chem lab I've been procrastinating up until today. I started my pre-lab yesterday for today, and my post-lab which I didn't finish. So I need to do that before I leave work today, considering my lab is tonight. I never can do these things until the last minute, when I'm forced to, but not having them done gives me anxiety. And I really should have tried to understand the experiment we'll be doing tonight better, but I'm preoccupied. Did I mention my car broke down Monday? I spent a large part of my day, pretty much all the moments I wasn't in school, getting a hold of my dad and then trying to start it while he was trying different things that might make it start. Turns out all it needed was to be hit really hard with a wrench on the fuel tank. But right now it's in So Jo, awaiting its entrance into the shop, and I'm driving the mini van till then. Yeah, I didn't get much homework done that day. Yesterday wasn't much better. I can't believe my roommate is able to study so much for this test with 21 credit hours and two jobs. Some people are too smart for their own good, and especially mine. Goodbye ham sandwich.

The Weekly Chronicle Of My Life.

I've put off writing anything real for quite a while now. I'm putting off a lot of things lately (namely homework), so it's hard to do anything I want or need to do when I know that I constantly need to do homework, and no matter how much of that I accomplish, there will always be more. Story of my life right now.

So this weekend marks the third one in a row where I've meant to buckle down and get serious about reading and doing the problems associated with my chosen courses, yet instead I've made plans to enjoy myself. What is wrong with me, right? Kind of sad that so much didn't happen this summer when I could have done these things, instead of now when I have no time. Not that I didn't enjoy relaxing and playing tennis mind. Anyway, my niece is getting married this Saturday, which is tomorrow. I can't do anything about that, but that's not till later and I did make extensive plans for the day time, which I definitely could have helped. Sheidi told me about this Brazilian Festival and Indian Festival, both taking place on Saturday and apparently similar to the Greek Festival, and both held within a pretty close proximity to the wedding I'm attending. I can't say no to food, so we're hitting both of them, along with some other friends from work hopefully (No I'm not hitting co-workers). The Greek Festival was pretty awesome last Saturday. You can't not love the music and dancing going on around you when it's so eccentric, compared to what you're used to. Apparently my old supervisor Mr. Lax's children were dancing there. His wife is Greek, and he bribed his son to do it--not surprising it took that for a 15 year old boy when a silly costume was involved. But the important thing is that I got my baklava fix. I also ate spitted lamb, which was the most amazing thing ever, along with some other deserts.

That same day I went rock climbing with Aaron, Clark, and Brett. On an actual rock. That was kind of a big deal for me, because I've never gone rock climbing on an actual mountain not made of plastic before. Clark belayed (?) while Aaron climbed up like freaking Spider Man to set the little loop things and rope (I know, my knowledge of rock climbing jargon is astounding). Brett went up next. Clark and I just stood there for the most part and he told me about his Ballroom dancing tournament in Vegas. He also struck random poses, which were oh so Clark, and made me laugh. Sadly he never got to climb. It started to get pretty overcast, which happens when you plan a rock climbing excursion at 2 am the night before (which is technically that day, but you know what I mean). I was half way up the rock face when it started to sprinkle--we're talking the big fat drops that happen when it's a hot day, and incidentally my favorite kind of rain. Then suddenly it was pouring. I kind of just kept going, till lightning happened of course, then I went down. But it was so cool being right there hugging a mountain during a rain storm. I'm a firm believer that rain smells so good because wet rocks and dirt smell so good. And no, wet dirt and mud are not the same thing. I totally licked rocks as a child. But anyway, the mountain smelled really good from where I was. Afterwards we went back to Brett's house and ate all of his icecream and cookies, then later that night, once I got back to Salt Lake, I went to this bonfire with some friends. Actually, we spent 2 hours trying to find Little Cottonwood Canyon, and once we found that and the actual campsite we spent about an hour more trying to find our particular bonfire. There were a lot of them happening there, but most of the other ones had booz and marijuana as well, I'm pretty sure. By the time we actually found the thing we were so tired that we didn't spend all that long at the actual bonfire. And considering I had work the next morning, I couldn't exactly lament that fact.

Other goings on this weekend: the guys I went rock climbing with are going on a camping/hiking/rock climbing excursion this weekend. I didn't feel like typing out names again, but it feels weird to have not done so. Anyway, the point is that I can not go. The wedding this weekend is a family thing, and thus obligatory, so that's the only reason why I'm going to these festivals and not Southern Utah, which I think is where it is. But I still want to go Splunking Aaron, so let me know if there are any more opportunities to brush up on my almost non-existent rock climbing techniques in the immediate future. Also, WJJ is going to a gun show this weekend. He offered me an invite after he called to get my address for a certain someone's wedding announcement, and I answered and simultaneously hung up on him in my Institute class (I could not figure out how to turn off the ring, and it was becoming increasingly more embarrassing by the moment, disrupting the class in such a way, so I did the only thing I could think of). But if anyone wants to witness WJ getting excited about shooting things, give him a call--I'm sure he'd appreciate making a spectacle of himself all the more the greater the number of people involved.

Do you like George Wendt?

So just wondering Pinkie: are you serious about wanting to go sky diving? Because I was talking to a friend who's gone before this past week, and it would cost 175 bucks--plus 40 if you want pictures and videos taken during--but I totally want to do it. I was thinking as part of my Fun Week 2007 list. You drop for a mile, then float with the parachute out for another mile. Apparently it's not so much scary as it is just peculiar feeling. And of course the first few times you go you have to be strapped to an experienced sky diver. Do I have any other takers? Let's take a survey.

Science Shmyence.

I guess it's been a while. I actually have quite a few things I would like to write about, but no time to do so. And actually I can't really think of them write now, as my memory is horrible, but I have some of the things that have happened to me this past week--that I would like to address-- written on a post-it somewhere. So that will have to wait. But not to worry; the time will come.

Right now I'm at the Marriot Library on Campus, but I really need to be at home doing my homework. I have 2 chapters for Genetics I need to read, and I need to start on my problem sets. I also have my O Chem Lab tomorrow, so I have to write up a pre-lab or something. I get so stressed out about labs. They're only worth half a credit, yet they take up most of your life. 4 hours of my week...only I'm hoping for it to only take up 2...then again with pre-labs and post-lab write-ups I'm betting on at least 4. Funny that I'm a scientist and yet I dread the actual part of my major that makes up what a scientist is. I simply don't like being rushed, yet I hate standing still for more than a half hour at a time, and the whole being graded to experiment thing is still a concept that eludes me. I mean, the exciting thing about experimenting is the not having bounds for learning, getting hands on experience, and the possibility of discovering something new or that will help your understanding of the world to widen. I mean, basic rules will keep you from burning off your hand (which is something I definitely appreciate), but if you're so worried about not getting something exactly right (because you'll be marked down for it), that it affects your ability to get it exactly right... It really is just me. Hopefully I'll get over it and in the future labs will intimidate me less. Maybe having a lab partner I know will help with that. She is pre-med; but I still wonder just how good she is at the lab part of these classes, having never seen how she does at such things.

That said, I really should be going. I just spent 70 bucks on my lab book and lab notebook. I'm a little irritated right now. Of course, I came from Institute before then, which was good, so that helped a little. And before that I went shopping with my sister. I really hate shopping, and she really hates shopping with me, but it had to be done. I needed pants, after tripping down the cement stairs at my house and ripping my only decent pair, and that was accomplished. Randomly we ran into my oldest sister and her two youngest kids, and her oldest, at the mall. I hate the mall. Anyway, she lives in Lindon, so that was really weird, but we had just been talking about how we wanted to hang out with Jessilee moments earlier, and suddenly there he was...so that was fortunate. My one-year-old niece Charity only likes me when I give her food, so thankfully I was holding a cinnamon sugar pretzel. Dallin refuses to hug me, or let me take pictures of him, except sometimes he randomly will--little punk. Jess realizes through years of experience that not hugging his aunties and letting us pinch his cheeks will only get him sandwiched. We went to the Dinosaur portion of the mall, and they seemed to have fun. Charity followed Dallin around saying, "where's Dallin?" whenever she lost sight of him. She totally adores the kid, who is 3 and largely ignores her; I simply can't imagine idolizing my brother in such a way--I managed to repress most of the memories that included him before his mission, which helps me to not hold anything against him now. He turned out to be an amazing person, but boy did he have a long way to go. Finally my little sis and I went to Best Buy, where she bought me 3 movies, and I was happy. But it took forever, which was my fault because I can't make decisions on my own, and my day went by with much on my list unaccomplished. I ultimately had my sister pick out the clothes she thought I should buy, because I'm so bad at doing that, and then after trying them on and showing them to her I just bought what she told me to. I like not having to think about these things, because I rarely like clothes I pick out myself. The clothes I like best I stole from siblings, and thus were selected by them. I'd now like to take the time to say that I seem to remember a certain roommate telling me once that she would be happy to be the person to do my shopping for me, and I would then just buy what she told me to; so I would just like to remind her of that promise right now for future instances.

And now I really do have to go. Thankfully I don't have work this week, so I'll be able to stay up late doing homework. Ooh, and even though buying books made me sad, I did buy a new little key-chain highlighter as well as the marker at the bookstore to replace the ones I lost. Also some little flash cards on a key-ring that will come in handy for O Chem reactions, names, and elements. I really do love shopping for office supplies--it's the only kind of shopping I like.