Back again.

Hello all! I am back at it. I am going to try my blogging again. I stopped during my Fall Final exams, because I needed all the studying I could get in. I kept journaling for myself, the old fashioned way. It's quite therapeutic. If you haven't done it, I dare you to try. I have trouble keeping up with it, but once I start writing, I can't stop! I write in a very stream-of-consciousness type of way when I journal with pen and paper. It's so different than this, in that I use spell check and edit these posts, however they may seem. I look forward to this, and even though right now I'm tired, I'm so excited to work on improving my blogs, and perhaps create something that others will want to, or maybe even enjoy reading on a regular basis! This is a new semester, and with a new semester I find myself feeling much more positive, and even excited to have another chance. Last semester didn't' go so well for me. In fact, it was one of the worst semesters of my College career. But yet I think I learned more about myself in that one semester than in any other, I also proved to myself that subjects I sometimes struggled in I can actually excel in. Goodnight to all. I will post tomorrow if I can.

Day 27: Workload and Juggling Life

So let me tell you. I have so many exams coming up, but I finally think I can handle it. I'm looking and planning, and feeling much better about it. I do, though, still struggle with getting distracted. I have been deciding to study out of my apartment, like the library or the campus center, so that I have less occasion to get distracted. I think it works, but honestly I don't know how to make myself buckle down. I am looking forward to the days I have less classes so I can work more.

Day 25: Irregular

SO I haven't been as regular with posts as I should be or as I planned to be in the beginning. I think that as I get more into the groove it will become easier, but I worry about Christmas Break. I am away from school for a whole month, but maybe I will post from home. I cant' wait for break, because maybe next semester will be better than this one was.

Day 23: TGIF

So it's Friday, so what? I work all weekend, and I don't get time to myself. What's to look forward to? Well, evidently this weekend it's supposed to snow. How do I feel about that? I'm not sure. I certainly like snow. When I don't have to shovel. I'm sure you'll agree, the white fluffy stuff brings only joy when you know you don't have to do anything but sit at your window with a cup of hot chocolate sipping it and watching it steam. But I, I have to pull on my new winter boots and run out there. NEW WINTER BOOTS! Yay! Alright so sometimes I act like a stereotypical girl. I get quite excited at the prospect of wearing anything new. Sooo... here's to new winter boots!

Day 21: My new obsession...

I wanna learn how to make blog layouts like this and that and this other one. Wow!!! *swoons* I didn't know it was possible but that is SO AWESOME!! GO check those out, even for a moment, RIGHT NOW! But then please come see me again some time soon. I look forward to it! :)

Day 20: I can't resist posting this.

I couldn't resist posting this, it is a link in a blog to a talk by Richard Hamming, "You and Your Research" Sounds boring but I could NOT stop reading. It is completely inspiring and if you have an intellectual mind I HIGHLY suggest you go here and read it.

Day 20: Begging to be taken seriously...

What does it really mean to grow up?
a.Get bigger
b.Get older
c.Get a job

There are many differing opinions on this one. When you're very young, everyone bigger is automatically older and wiser, from the paperboy to the mailman to the grandfather living across the street. It seems to you that it will be just forever until you are "old enough" to matter. So then you get there... the next milestone you see. You turn that age you once looked up to, but for some reason IT FEELS NO DIFFERENT! you don't feel bigger older or wiser. And so it goes. You graduate eighth grade, then high school. You learn to drive, turn 18 and can vote, turn 21 and can drink (legally). I have known people who in all honestly don't act any different today when they are 20 than they did when they were 12.

But yet almost all of us, that it, my age, the college crowd, have probably said at least once: "Why don't they (insert... "my parents" or "my friends" here) trust me?" or something similar. And I've been frustrated with this from the day I went off to college. Frustrated because, damn it, I'm a good girl. I don't drink, smoke, or run around to frat houses. I study (though as I've mentioned before I do struggle from procrastination), I read, I do my work, I... do "everything right." But yet, my parents still see fit to lecture me on everything under the sun, and when my parents see me or talk to me, they can't seem to ever see when I've done anything right. Things I am proud of they just shoot down. And I wonder why I care, really care, so much about what they think. If I'm Miss Independent, if I'm all grown up and mature about life, why do I still screw up so much?

I WANT...
to buckle down and not procrastinate,
to not sleep through an alarm or make excuses,
to graduate with good grades,
to not let anyone down,
to go on to get a job I enjoy and that supports my living,
to (some years down the line) be a wife and a mother and own my own home,
to have pets and land and a place to finally call my own.

(And here I must admit... it feels DAMN GOOD to put that all down and stare at that list, realizing that, really, those are truly the goals my heart desires, and it's not an impossible list, a pipe dream, and a terrible trek to get there, after all. )

Once I got going, making my list of wants, of plans, of desires for the future, it came so fast and so simply. I encourage everyone to try it, and maybe post it in a blog, because honestly nothing is more freeing than realizing there is a potential for SO MANY people to see a post and read it and know your heart. How can you slack ever again when everyone knows your goals, and everyone will know if you have followed through?

So, honestly this post is an extension of a sort of odd epiphany I had over thanksgiving break. I had time with my family, and time to look at them, and think about why I really look up to each of them. Let me explain, I was, for many years, the youngest kid in my family, so I was the baby, and I've had plenty of cousins to watch through the years.

Now, the majority of them are in their 30's and married/have kids. And I stare at them and wish I could bypass college and go straight to that; to a stable life with a set schedule where you go to work, come home, and forget about work until the next day. Where you have weekends (usually) off and where you have the same people you love to look forward to after every single day. Really, I want the structure. Thats where I failed when I came to college, I lost the structure, and even though I'm a pretty organized person, but having freedom, although it was nice, gave me too much time for my mind to wander, to look at the possibilities in front of me. I unfortunately like the computer too much. Or rather, the internet. Ironic, since that's where I am now. :)

So I like the internet, or rather go through phases of addiction to different things, like a game (*cough*Second Life*cough*) or a site (You Tube.. I like following channels with a storyline...). It kills me, but I often stay up late doing it, being distracted, which causes me to lose mucho sleep, and then I sleep through the morning and sometimes miss classes, it's terrible but true and i know if I can learn to control that part of my life i will do SO MUCH better at everything else. Ha, did you ever notice sometimes you are thinking things but you don't realize them, or really acknowledge them until you put them down on paper? This is a pretty stream of consciousness post for me today, and forgive me if it comes through too much. I'm really just trying to get to the point. :)

My point is, since I now see where I have gone wrong and can or need to change, I know how to change and how to fix it. I've given myself the power by thinking it all out, and to do this, to be able to change how I've been living, to see where I am wrong and fix it, to be mature enough to admit when I was wrong to the world (ok to the few who read my blog)... THAT is what it means to "grow up." We look up to those people we choose to look up to because it always seems that they have it all together. When you're a few years old, the paperboy is the one who has a job and had money to spend, when you're in eighth grade the High School kids are applying to college, when you're in college the 30 year olds have jobs and families.

Always we are aspiring to be more organized, and more IN CONTROL of our lives. But just because we can be in control doesn't mean we all take responsibility for it. My peers who go out every night and drink to the point of recklessness, even those older than me, are not in any way more mature than me, but just because I don't have the same vices they do doesn't make me any better. If they stay out drinking and I stay up playing a game, come on, admit it, I'm still on their level. My goal and my battle cry is to get past these things, these stupid addictions holding me back. In 5 years who will know what I did in Second Life, or how many beers the kid down the hall can drink? They'll only see the job we both do (or do not) have and judge us as we judge the world, by how much we "have it together." So in fact, stating my goal for the next few weeks or rather the rest of my life as "I want to get it together," is really a much deeper statement then it seems.

And I'd like to challenge you now. If you see someone else struggling to grow up, to get out of the rut of addiction, of holding onto something that's holding them back, I'd like you to slap them in the face (not literally, I don't condone violence ;)) with the facts of their life, because often the people outside one's life can see the life so much clearly than the person living the life. I've had people do that for me in the past,and it really does help. Although sometimes it is required to state these facts MANY TIMES before it can soak in.

I know I'm not going to be perfect from now on. In fact, I KNOW I will fail a few times. To expect perfection is idiotic, but to accept failure is insane. I know I can do better, and I always will have pride in myself. College is a buffer time, time for growth before we hit the Real World. So, college students, seize this time while you can. Fail a few times, but be mindful of your failure, and use it to improve. You have a minimum of 4 WHOLE YEARS to fail, and if you don't fail once all the more power to you, but I have a feeling that means you haven't yet grown enough to fail. Or you're still not open to see the failure and admit it. If you have any personal things you have a need to let out, any failures to reason out on paper (erm, virtual... paper...?) feel free to post a comment, or email me, because I'd love your feedback.

Forgive my lack of posts in the past week, but it was all minute adjustments to this post, as I wanted to sound lucid. Thank you for being patient!

PAPER

Deleted... but it's an interesting story. Did you see when I had my paper posted here? Alright. Well, I was writing the paper in a library, and that library did not have Microsoft word. In addition, the computers had a nasty habit of unexpectedly restarting and losing all my work. So, remembering the wonderful properties of Auto-Saved blog postings, I took advantage of it and wrote my paper on Blogger before transferring it to Word to finish it's formatting. I'm sorry for those of you who had to have it take up your time, but now, I will go back to normal blogs! And if you got a chance to read it, you got a rare glimpse into my life! Congratulations! :)

Suldog: Thanksgiving Comes First

Suldog: Thanksgiving Comes First

Day 13: THANKSGIVING COMES FIRST!

Alright, time to do it, and Thanksgiving is a few days away. This is a post inspired by Suldog.

So, a few months ago there were already Christmas decorations in the stores. They started small, with pretty red bows on various things that had no need for them, and soon Santa was inside the store, when outside the weather could still be described as... warm. I'm sorry, when I think of Santa, I think of snow days and blustery winds and the like... it makes me feel like I had stepped into one of those Christmas-all-year-round stores. And, in my opinion, it's sad. I really enjoy Thanksgiving, from the colors: browns and oranges and reds, to the turkeys you make when you trace your hand on a piece of construction paper. you know, and then you color each finger a different color and give your thumb a beak, eyes, and a gobbler (that little red thing hanging off Mr. Turkey's chin)? :)

Fall is one of my favorite seasons as well. I love winter and snow, but hate to shovel. (Who doesn't?) If I see Santa in the store, I walk out thinking about long hours of "lift from the knees" while shoveling of snow, basically moving water from one place to the other. And no matter how fast I shovel, in the morning the snow plow has still left a mound of snow for me to dig through. And don't you worry, over night that cute little mound has frozen, so now I have this little mount everest for my car to attempt to climb. Makes me wish I had a Hummer, not a Subaru.

Regardless, I HATE that they skip over one of my favorite seasons. It's terrible and I won't stand for it! Alright so, what can I really do about it? Well, Suldog says:

OK, here's my list of offenders, thus far. I will be boycotting these places and things. I hope that, in addition to posting, you'll make a list of your own. I'll boycott yours, if you'll boycott mine.

TARGET
MACY'S
LOWE'S

All three have had Christmas advertisements running on television. I will never shop at any of these stores again, until I either get a guarantee from them that they will forego holiday advertisements until at least the week of Thanksgiving - I'm not insensitive to the need to advertise their big sales for the Friday after Thanksgiving - OR next November rolls around and I do not see advertisements, by them, touting Christmas in early November.

So, you can certainly do that if the passion is within you! I think I can live without those stores, maybe you can, too, or you can think of your own. Our hope, that is, all of us who have responded to Suldog's call to arms, is that we can persuade stores that early advertising does not garner more sales, and is not worth doing so early...

I have more to say but it will be saved for a later post. PLEASE GO CHECK OUT SULDOG'S ORIGINAL POST! :) Please? It's really worth it.

Day 12: Emotions run Wild...

Living in an apartment with all females, although at times we get along great, sometimes I swear we PMS simultaneously, and it is not a pretty sight. In addition, I'm a person that normally attempts to completely hide and emotion from them, I don't know why I do it, I guess because I hate the feeling of appearing weak. But I think at these times I just appear to be an unfeeling... B***h. I really want it all to work out with us, and I get really frustrated, sometimes I feel that although their requests are good (we're been going over ground rules to make us all happier in the apartment), the way they ask makes them sound hypocritical... alright I'll go into more detail tomorrow I think.

Day 11: incoherent

(Insert anecdotal story involving a spontaneous hour-long drive, Johnny Rocket's, being scared in a dark city WHEN DRUNKS HAVE ALREADY GONE TO BED, and a broken car when no one in the area is awake to tow. Than add on a long search for a random stranger willing to jump said car, and a drive back home, and arriving home at 5:30 AM.) I'm sorry I'm not coherent at this point, but the trip was quite a shining example of Murphy's Law. And I work today, in... under 5.5 hours. *cries a little* To top it all off, I'M NOT TIRED!! This indicates I will feel this little trip greatly in a few days, and will live off of coffee for at least the next two.

Day 10: FRIDAY

I think the title says it all. And I"m also happy because next week is Thanksgiving, who doesn't like that! I think today I'll talk all about food. Yesterday at my school's dining hall they had Thanksgiving night, don't ask me why they did it so early, but, the did. And guess what? THEY HAD POMEGRANATES!!! Hehe I haven't had one in ages, so last night I had lots of fun with that.

How to open and eat a Pomegranate:
(Oh, what the hell, I'll do it right and copy and past someone else's pretty instructions...)

This is what you need 1) A pomegranate 2) A big bowl of water 3) A knife 4) Your fingers

First with your knife slice the pokey end off the top

Next with your knife score the skin of the pomegranate from top to bottom as if you were making it look like a pumpkin. You don't want to cut too deep and damage those magical seeds. Just deep enough to peel each section back a little later on.

Now place your pomegranate in your bowl of water. This is the breakthrough. This is the killer app.

While keeping the pomegranate in the water and using just your fingers gently peel a section apart. This is the epiphany monet. You should notice something that will literally change your life and make pomegrante's a bigger part of your life. Yes, it's true the seeds sink helplessly to the bottom of the bowl while the other nasty stuff you don't eat, floats to the top.

Keep working until you have a huge pile of seeds at the bottom and then skim all the non-edible stuff off the top and throw it away.

Now drain the water and you have a pile of crunchy, juicy, anti-oxidant filled pomegranate seeds to enjoy.

Remember these babies stain like nobodies business. So be careful.

Now, I have to repeat the stain warning... do not wear a shirt you are not willing to have purple spots on! Also might stain your fingers a tiny but, but it's well worth it. Also, though I didn't do it this time, the little individual seedy things freeze very well without losing their texture, so if you don't eat all the seeds in one sitting you can save them for a later date! Keep in mind, pomegranates are VERY healthy.

Check out my poll... what's your favorite type of pie at Thanksgiving time?

Day 9: Multiple Posts

I realize some days I post once or not at all and other days I can't stop talking. I think it will be a better idea to post once at night, though honestly it's when the mood hits me and I'm not sure I can control it.

Tonight I went for a nice walk and got some dinner with my boyfriend. We had gone to the mid-week church service and it was nice to relax, though I haven't been feeling well and I had a headache for a lot of the time. I can be so grumpy, but I got over it. He's so tolerant of me, and he knows how to make me feel better even when I'm in one of my "moods" which I find myself being in more and more lately.

I was browsing around blogs and I came upon a few that I liked, which led me to something called NaNoWriMo. *giggles* What a name, right? It's a cool concept, National Novel Writing Month. Some people commit to writing a whole novel in a month, 50,000 words. Crazy, huh? Stemming off that, there's NaBloPoMo, National Blog Posting Month. *giggles* People out there can be crazy, but the concept is cool. I was thinking of finding some daily blog prompt sites, to get me writing not only about my life but more about things, I believe that more things happen to me in a day that would make good material, but I'm unsure where to look at this point.

I've come a cross many interesting blogs, and I will try adding more to my list of blogs very soon... :)

Day 8: Stepping It Up

Many thanks to David McMahon of authorblog for his advice. :) As a new blogger, I appreciate any feedback I can get.

*raises her eyebrows* Well, I was attempting to add a picture to this post but for some reason it's not working. But, as this IS a blog, after all, I'll leave my attempt up so you can feel my pain. :)

"Dear diary... Posting pictures is harder than it seems... Love, Di."

(Hey, did anyone else notice how many of my post names begin with S? hehe, I'll try and work on that for you.)

Day 8: Live and Learn

Ok so I missed a day. Not the end of the world. Let me tell you, Tuesdays and Wednesdays are the busiest days of my week. And the earliest, and the latest. Go figure. The other days I only have one class each day. Tuesday, yesterday, I had an exam at night. I did fairly well, I think, but since I've been so stressed about it it's a relief if nothing else to have gotten it over with.

One issue I have is skipping classes... terrible thing to do , I know, but regardless, I do it. Then I fall into the trap of telling myself that I'll get some "very important thing" done in that time, and therefore equal it out. It never does. I am going to work on getting to class on time, and posting this on my blog for all to see is my attempt at making myself somehow accountable... well that's the theory, at least.

My frustration of the day. There is a bandwidth limit on my internet connection, and so time spent online is a commodity, especially because SL takes up so much bandwidth. Well, last night I fell asleep and didn't turn it off til I woke up. Luckily when I am not moving around it uses less bandwidth, but it is still a huge chunk of time online. So, I woke up this morning to see I"m over my limit. Now I have to sit here, waiting to see whether I lose the internet for another few days. When you're in college so many things in life are transmitted via computer, and this is a huge loss for me... so could you keep your fingers crossed for me? Thanks! :D

Day 6: Sleeping.

I have been ridiculously tired all day. I slept til 10, but at 5 I passed out and didn't' wake up til 10 PM. Some days I swear I must have mono or something... it's terrible. Anyway today was my studying day for an exam tomorrow, so now I'll be staying up all night. well not all night. if i do that i tend to fall asleep in the exam.. now THAT is never good... I"m trying to stay awake.. will probably go eat food now. :) Hmm... oatmeal...

Day 5: Skipping.

"Must... not.. skip.. a blog..." :D

So, I really want to make this a habit so even though I don't have much to say, here ya go. My daily blog. I worked all of my waking hours today. Nope, actually that's a lie. I used photoshop to create my first item of clothing in SL. I learned a valuable lesson about clothes, but that's for another day. Needless to say it frustrates me to have to pay $10 L every time I upload an image. So Right now, I'm dead broke. An even zero. How nice is that? lol. Anyway once I am happy with the way the outfit I am making looks, I'll post it for your viewing pleasure. Yayy pictures! Now I'm off to find some grub. Wish me luck!

Day 4: Stress

When under stress, I enjoy a good laugh. Mean girls gives that, and practical advice, too. Check THIS out! :)

Day 3: P2 (Inspirations)

The inspiration for my blog name... I found a blog with the lyrics today and I just had to include it.

So, today was quite a day. I had a psychology exam, and then a Physics Lab. Draining to say the least. I've been trying to learn to better manage my time, but I have a SERIOUS procrastination issues. I'm a mess. I'm trying to figure out how to make myself buckle down. I've tried all the tactics.. rewarding myself, setting reasonable goals down on paper, the works. If you have suggestions, I'd love to hear them. In high school, I was an A student. Now, in college, I try my hardest but either I procrastinate, or don't do as well as I had hoped, anyway. It must be my fault, but I can't seem to stop it.

On a happier note, It's Friday! TGIF, but for me it means the start of a weekend in which I work, both days. I love my job though, so it's cool. I'm getting ready to go out tonight... hah, there we go, something else you don't know: I'm a really shy girl in person, and I don't drink, smoke or do drugs. (I can hear the scoffing laughter, you know!) No, really. I'm going out for a time of fellowship. It's just us girls tonight, gonna have a good time!