This journal will not be updated anymore. If you want to follow me down the rabbit hole, leave a comment and I'll let you come along.

Sorry I haven't given you insight to my life lately. It's been flat-out boring. I bought a nice flowered, somewhat-Hawaiian, but almost-all-the-way-flamboyant shirt. I found it for $5.00 on a clearance rack (the kind that make you take off 50%, followed by 65%, followed by another 25%, and then add a little tax) and while I may get a LOT of slack for it, I figured clothes are clothes and it shouldn't matter if it's comfortable (which it is). I coincided this awsome find by buying another shirt for... a lot more. And it's not even name brand, for crying out loud. Oh well. I hope I get a lot of use out of it.

In other news, I have to go to a banquet to accept a scholarship that I won. It's that Kam Leung Wong one where I had to do a 500 word essay about the Chinese people that used to/still live around here. I was surprised I won, but I don't think a whole lot of people entered, anyway. Well, more money for me I guess. Hehe. I hope the banquet doesn't last all day, though. I'm trying to brace myself for it, but I'm not quite sure what to expect.

That's all for now. Sorry I suck.

( y dos mas del cielo )

Since my computer was reformatted, I haven't had the resources to upload pictures from my camera. After stumbling upon a copy of Photoshop hidden between a mass of books in my room, I now have the ability to make room for more photos in my camera. I know I'm terrible at taking pictures, but I think it's something fun to do to pass the time. And I like looking at the sky.

I went to Spider-Man on Thursday at the 9:45 showing and I loved it, just as the majority of the other spectators. Cinematic beauty, I tell you. Everyone should see it in the theatres because I don't know if it will be as good when it's brought over to DVD. Just do it.

Since it's been about four days since I got back from orientation, I thought maybe it was time to give a halfway decent update on how it went.

Orientation lasted only Monday and Tuesday, but since I live so far away I left Sunday and stayed at a hotel, but that's boring drivel and should not have been mentioned. Man, I suck. Anyway, Sunday was spent discovering where I was supposed to meet (at 8:00am the next day, no less). Since the campus is pretty good sized, we had to follow the meticulously crafted directions mailed to us before. While skimming through these, I noticed a nice checklist that had been written on there -- a checklist that listed everything I SHOULD have done and SHOULD have brought with me to the orientation. I was apparently going to be tested within the next few days. Upon reading this, my head spun (literally; I was like a circus performer...or that girl on the Exorcist) and I felt screwed. They wanted to test me on Math and Modern Languages, and I felt at least SOMEWHAT confident for the latter. The former, however, was an entirely different story. Math? Me? WITHOUT studying? Psh, right. So, thinking quickly, I called my brother (with my newly purchased cell phone [as of Sunday, anyway]) and asked if he had a calculator at his house (you see, a calculator was required and my brother has a house with a bunch of people in the same town of my school; convenient, eh?). He didn't, but he thought he had a friend who did, and sure enough, the friend delivered. He went and got it for me, and I swung by the next morning and grabbed it before orientation started. Of course, it had to be a TI-86 when the only thing I'm accustomed to is a TI-83 Plus and MAYBE a TI-89 (which was prhibited on the test), so I spent a few random moments figuring out how to graph and whatnot. And then, during this oh-so-boring speech from this oh-so-annoying lady who I wanted to punch and throw popcorn and orange juice at, I began rereading the notes for the math test (from here on out will be referred to as the COMPASS test, because that's what it's called) and found out that the only people FORCED to take it were people who got high math scores on their ACT or SATs and people who haven't taken standardized tests at all. Fortunately enough for me, I didn't qualify for either of these, so I just skipped out of it completely. Hooray for my slackerness.

Instead, I attended a few of the discussions going on throughout the day. I made a valiant effort to pay attention and to get my lingering questions answered before it was too late. The shyness in me intervened and I didn't ask anything, of course, and my attention dwindled as well to the point where I almost got up to leave and go to a movie or something, but I DID stay - so even if I didn't take too much of it in, by showing up I made some kind of impact (impact?). And I can't remember where I was going with this, but I don't think it was important. So I went to this stupid technology literacy class where I had to take a "test" (I wouldn't consider it one, because a lot of the questions were "Do you think...?" questions) in cramped desks, by people who didn't like me because I kept nailing my elbow into them due to my left-handed disability. Stupid desks. After that I went to a few more discussion sessions and took the modern language test, which I felt kicked my butt. So I went back to the hotel, took a nap, and went swimming (instead of learning, bahaha). The rest of the night was spent watching tv and calling my friend.

So, when I woke up the next day, I was expecting a lackluster day filled with the confusing registration process along with the results from the language test. After being redirected to the same two tables about eight times, I got the results. Of course, I had NO idea WHAT the results were trying to tell me, so I got frustrated and went to register. I went to talk to this professor who started to get annoyed with me after I finished with him, and was told that I tested into Spanish 202. Anywho, the registration process took THREE HOURS. I wanted to shoot myself in the face, but instead I filled out a long survey about religion and science (basically, creationism vs evolution). I talked to this other professor who filled out my class registration card for me, giving me all classes between 7:00am to 12:00pm. When I went to one of the helper students, they changed my schedule upside-down and spread the classes out so that I have one class at 8:00am and the next at 1:00pm or 3:00pm -- and it's like that five days a week. I may still change them via the school's website, though. The classes I'm taking right now (as best as I can remember) are as follows: General Studies (where I get to learn HOW to study and how to manage my time), General Psychology (I had a crappy Psychology teacher in high school; what I really want to take is abnormal psychology, but I can't find it), Information Gathering (both regular Intro to Mass Communications and the honors Intro to Mass Communications were filled up for some freaking reason, so I'll have to wait until the Spring semester), Spanish 202, Speech (funny story about speech: I have the class twice a week or something, but I have it two times in one day; once at 10:00am or something, and once at 3:00pm -- weirdest thing EVER), Math something-or-another (I don't care because I'm never taking math again after this), and I THINK that's all. I could be wrong.

On the way home that same day (Tuesday), I bought shoes. I hate buying shoes. What a waste of money.

Bye everyone. I'll see you on Tuesday or Wednesday or something.

Hooray for orientation. Ugh.

Awhile ago - when I had started to consider the colleges that I wouldn't mind attending - I had thoughts about applying to Creighton (in Omaha). Looking at the cost had turned me off a little bit, but the place is gorgeous. Of course, I've never visited the place, but from the various pictures I've seen - which, ironically enough, are taken and printed to appeal to students who are on the fence about where they want to go...hmm.. - it's an incredible place.

Anyway, my decision ultimately ended with my applying and eventual acceptance to an in-state school. I'm fine with getting my generals done in an in-state school. I mean, they WILL be cheaper, and it's better to get some classes done within a public college. Private schools, more likely than not, take credits that have been earned in a public school, whereas if the credits were obtained in a private school, it would be harder to get the public school to take them. At least, that's about how the information that my friend had relayed to me went.

But, when we get to the end of it all, the cost is what will probably keep me away, even if I DO only go there for a few years as opposed to four (or more). I wanted to do this WUE thing (I can't remember what it stands for -- Western Undergraduate something-or-another I think), which would cut the costs for a year in half plus adding 10% of the costs or something. So I figured that it would be best to use that AFTER I transfer over there if I did, in fact, do that after a few years. This piece of planning made me feel just a little better about the whole ordeal (almost every single one of my friends went out of state because they're all smarter and got more opportunities I guess; so, needless to say, I felt a little out of place about going in-state. Luckily, though, my friend is going to the same school as I am. AND we got into the same residence hall I think. Yay). Dreams were shattered once again when I find out -- at work on Thursday, of all places -- that you can only apply for the WUE thing on your Freshman year.

It's not THAT big of a deal, though. If I REALLY want to go there, I'll pay for it and be in debt for the rest of my life. Not like it wouldn't happen if I went anywhere else.

Small update on the roommate situation: I found that he has an MSN profile. No picture, unfortunately, but I did find out that our favorite books are the Harry Potter series, although we do not have an interest in reading. Other than that he sounds ok - someone I can get along with for awhile, at least. I still have yet to call him, though. I'm going to wait until after orientation or something.

HOLY BORING POST, BATMAN!

I hate working. I'm almost more excited to go to school and attempt to learn and to live with someone who I've never met and will probably not get along with because, of course, he'll have opinions about me.

Speaking of that, I got my roommate assigned the other day. They gave me his name (complete with his middle initial, which I can probably use for a conversation starter or something I guess) and his phone number. Always being the thinker, I grabbed a phone book and checked the area code. Turns out he's from a town that's about the same size as mine (or so I've heard, but honestly I don't know - I think, though, that his school is around the same size as mine, as we're both A-schools [AA-schools are the biggest, and B-schools are the smallest]). I don't know what that would have to do with anything, since school size amounts to about nothing in the long run. I know that I should attempt to make some kind of contact before the actual move-in day since we'll have to figure out who's going to bring what so we don't end up with two microwaves or something similar. The thing is, though, that I don't want to talk to him. I know it's not a very good thing to say that, but I don't want to make the first attempt at getting ahold of him - personally, I think I'm better off not knowing him now and hoping that he'll be the perfect roommate rather than finding out soon that he's not what I was expecting and being disappointed for the rest of the summer. I should probably call him though, if only to prepare myself. You know, give myself a little bit of time to set my mind for what will end up being a wonderful year with a wonderful stranger-of-a-roommate.

Oh, you know you love my pessimism.

Oh, and how about those opinions, eh? Ugh. I must be pissing people off at work about as much as they're pissing me off. Well, see, actually I'm not just naturally angry or anything toward the people I work with, because they're a nice group of people and I know them pretty well. The thing that irks me about them is that they treat me like I'm a mental defect. They think I'm flat-out stupid and that I can't hear them when they talk. It's almost comparable to every year of middle school and high school wrapped into these people that I can't get away from (whereas in school I could go befriend some other person). I sort of had an inkling while I was working here last year, but I didn't really catch on until the week. And it's way too unfortunate for them because they SHOULD have learned to leave their exclusive "in-groups" back at high school when they graduated three years ago - it's not like it'll benefit them at all in their futures. It's not that big of a deal, though, because I don't need them to be my friend.

I just need them to sign my paychecks. ;)