Hi guys,

Have you ever noticed how time doesn't behave the way you want it to? When you're waiting for something, it slows waaaaay down, so that minutes feel like hours and a single day feels like an entire week. The same applies to meetings and classes - it feels like your brain is moving ten times faster than everything else, so that you come up with a million other things you *could* be doing... all in the first ten minutes. This leaves lots of time for your mind to bounce around like a kid on a road trip, constantly asking "are we there yet?!?!"

It's an incredibly frustrating concept, matched only by its twin - time speeding up when you're trying to avoid something. You know what I'm talking about. You're so totally focused on how much you don't want to do the thing you've been avoiding that it turns into tunnel vision, blocking out everything else that's happening around you. This makes it a heck of a lot harder to note the passing of time. The result? A sort of mental catapult that makes time pass so fast that you're at the "doomsday" before you know it. Of course, as soon as you get to that point, time (the sneaky bastard) slows right back down so that you can savour every second of whatever it is you've been putting off. Cruel, isn't it?

I have to say that I've been going through a lot of both of these phenomena lately. On one hand, I've been looking forward to getting my tattoos and going home for reading week, and it turns out they're 3 Very Long Weeks away. On the other hand, I start midterms (sort of) in less than a week even though it feels like I've had almost no class time. Why can't these events switch places, so that I can put off midterms (and have time to study for them) and fly home/get my tats right away? It's not fair! Someone needs to do something about this...

Ciao for now,
Me

P.S. Yes, I did change the blog template. I think it's less visually crowded and much easier to read than the old format. Thoughts, anyone?

Hi peeps,

Sorry for the late post. It's been kind of a weird week - everything's seemed to come and go in waves this week. Let me explain:

So last Sunday was my birthday, which means I'm now legal to drink everywhere except in the US. You'd think it would be a huge event, but you'd be (mostly) wrong. While my awesome roommate did buy me a cake so that everyone could sing to me, that was about the extent of the festivities for the day. The rest of the partying happened on Thursday and yesterday, when I had 2 family parties - one at an Irish pub downtown and another at my aunt's house the following day. It was a lot of fun! Oh yeah, and my big birthday present was a Keurig coffee maker - one of those single-cup deals that takes "pods" instead of grounds. I think it's safe to say that I'm going to have a lot of fun with that...

Of course, nothing really happened on Monday or Tuesday. My big accomplishment was getting groceries for the week. W00t. It should be noted that I was supposed to get my tats on Tuesday, but the appointment's been bumped to Feb. 13th because the artist was afraid that the meds I'm on would thin too much and I'd bleed the ink out. I have to say, it was a major disappointment - not only was I getting myself all worked up, but I had chosen that particular Tuesday because it was right after my birthday and the tats are my birthday present to myself. So yeah, I was pretty bummed.

Wednesday was pretty uneventful as well, aside from the fact that my grandparents came to visit and I moved into their hotel for a few days. I know it seems kind of pointless, but I just couldn't pass up a clean, warm shower plus access to a TV and a comfy bed. Of course, getting the chance to be spoiled by my grandparents was pretty nice too :)

And that brings us to Thursday and Friday, when I had my parties. Like I said, they were a blast. I was so proud of myself for being able to order a beer at the pub - even better, I wasn't ID'ed.

So that's my week in a nutshell. Sorry once again for the erratic posts - I think I'm going to try switching to Thursdays, since I only have one class that day. Any objections?

TTFN,
Me

I promise I'll write more tomorrow, but for now I just wanted to post the design my tattoo artist sent me. :D:D:D

Hi all,

Sorry I missed a post last week. I was enjoying my last days at home just a bit too much!

Anyways, the point of this post is actually to tell you about the Orlando trip. I don't want to bore you with an essay, so I'll just give you the highlights:

The Rooms - The hotel we stayed at had condo-style rooms, meaning that we had an actual kitchen, bedrooms, washing machine and a living room. Even better, each family got their own room, so we actually had plenty of space. It was really really nice - it felt like absolute luxury to someone who's been sharing an 8x11 box for the past 4 months.

Shopping - we blew an insane amount of time and money at Target. It's just so fun being able to look at all the American stuff that we Canadians can't get at home!
Other than that, we went to Downtown Disney a lot. It's a neat little touristy shopping area, with lots of cool souvenirs and displays and stuff. The two best stores (in my opinion) were the mismatched socks store (yes, it exists) and the Disney art gallery, which sold everything that my mom and sister could have ever wanted. Seriously, they were drooling all over the place!

Universal - We bought a week pass and went 3 or 4 times during the trip. Harry Potter World was REALLY cool, even if it was packed. And the rides in the park were amazing!

(We did go to Disney by the way, but the one day we went they closed most of the parks due to overcrowding. Serious bummer.)

Cirque du Soleil - This was our New Year's Eve event, despite the fact that we went at 6 in the evening. The show was INCREDIBLE - very trippy and surreal. And the way the artists used their bodies was mind-blowing!

Christmas - We did in fact do Christmas dinner and a gift exchange while we were away. It was kind of nice getting together the way we did :)

So yeah. That's my Disney trip in a nutshell. Not sure when I'll post next week, since I get my tattoos on Tuesday (!!!!!!!!!!!) and my wrists will probably hurt like hell for the next couple of days.

TTFN,
Me

Hey guys,

Sorry for last week's missing post. I was kind of stressed - I'll explain why in the first two parts of this 3-part post. Sorry if it's a little messy, but I needed to get this out.

Part the First: So I get back to school from my trip home a few weeks ago, and start noticing weird bug bites popping up on my legs. I figured it was probably nothing - university is full of creepy crawlies that can be picked up anywhere and everywhere. Still, they're irritating, so I keep an eye on them. It isn't until almost 2 weeks later that I start to suspect bedbugs. I didn't say anything for a few days after that, since I didn't want to alarm my roommate. The Friday before winter break started, though, I discovered a bedbug crawling across my pillow. The little [censored] was filled with my blood, too!

Needless to say, stuff hit the fan pretty quickly. We reported the issue to the front desk of our res, and while things were taken care of very efficiently it was still a lot of work. We were moved into an apartment for the weekend (with our own oven! And bathroom! and TV!) since the exterminator couldn't come til Monday, which meant that we didn't have access to everything that we both needed to pack for our trips home that Tuesday. We were also given $20 and told to wash every. single. washable. thing. we owned - my stuff amounted to about 6 loads. We then had to bag our laundry plus whatever we had left, and prep the room for fumigation. Once this was taken care of, we still had to pull out everything we needed to bring home with us, haul it down to the apartment, and check everything for leftover bugs as we packed. By the end, my roommate and I were both in hysterical laughter/tears. It was that bad.

Part 2: On top of dealing with bedbugs, I also found out that I need to screw around with my medications again. For those of you who don't know, I've suffered from migraines/ice pick headaches (which get their name from the fact that they feel like someone's slamming an ice pick into your head, no exaggeration) since I was 15. Since the diagnosis, I've been through literally every on- and off-label medication my neurologist could think of, meaning that I've dealt with more than my fair share of side effects*. Of these, only two seemed to work. Since one of the two caused "inhibited mental function" (not that you could tell), I started taking indomethacin sometime last year.

On top of that, I started taking citalopram (Celexa) for depression a couple of months ago. Normally this is not recommended, since both it and the indomethacin can mess with the platelets in your blood pretty badly and possibly cause internal bleeding**. The combo seemed to work really well though - my headaches and depression were both under control, and I had almost no side effects after my body adjusted to the new meds. That is, until I started getting weird bruises and nosebleeds. Red flags went up, since both of these can be warning signs that my platelet levels weren't normal. So I went to the doctor's, and he was concerned enough that he decided that I needed to change one drug or the other. Since I couldn't really change the indomethacin, it was decided that I needed to quit Celexa. There was a catch though - if I wanted to change that, I wouldn't be allowed to try most other antidepressants* because they too would screw with my platelets. Of course this all happened on the same Friday that I discovered the bedbugs, which was also four days before vacation started. Meaning that I'm stuck with the same drugs until after I get back to school. It's been more than a little stressful, since I'm basically paranoid that every little spot of blood means that I'm dying. This makes my vacation a little less enjoyable, especially since I've been doing a lot of walking lately and it's given me wicked blisters.

This leads into Part III, aka the Happy Part or The Part that Justifies the Title. See, I've been doing a lot of walking because I've been in Orlando for the past 5 days, and we've been pulling 7-hour trips to Disney and Universal for the past 3. We've done lots of shopping (I'll probably end up bragging about my purchases in my next post), been on a bunch of cool rides and basically been having a blast since we got here. And we're only halfway through the trip! The best part of all is that my grandparents rented 3 condos instead of hotel rooms, so we've had a ton of space to spread out. It's amazing.

Sorry there's almost no connection between the parts, by the way. I'm exhausted from spending the day at Disney so my brain's not working so well. I'll write more later.

Lots of love,
Me

*If you want a more technical explanation, it's that citalopram is classified as an SSRI (Selective Seratonin Reuptake Inhibitor), and it's this quality that both helps with depression and messes with platelets. Unfortunately, the vast majority antidepressants are also SSRIs, meaning that if I take them they'll more than likely mess with my platelets as well.

**I HATE SIDE EFFECTS. It's almost like I don't know my own body.

Hey peeps,

Figured I'd try my hand at something slightly different this week. So without further ado, I present to you the Top 10 Ways You Know it's Finals Time!

10. The convenience stores run out of coffee and energy drinks by 11 every morning.
9. Sleep goes from being a necessity to something needed only by the weak.
8. Your Facebook news feed is filled with 4 types of statuses: "I'm so screwed!!!1!11!", "Just kicked ass/had my ass kicked by my last exam", "ZOMG I CAN'T REMEMBER (insert obscure fact here)! SOMEBODY HELP!" and "Dear God let this be over".
7. You can get a contact high just by stepping outside. Dealers everywhere are rejoicing.
6. There are more people in the library than there are in res.
5. Campus becomes unnaturally quiet... except for the random screams/howls outside your window.
4. You barely even register said screams/howls, unless you feel like joining in.
3. Everyone's trying to teach themselves a semester's worth of material in under a week. As a result, they start leaking random bits of information.
2. Everybody looks like a zombie: they have the look of death in their eyes, they crave brains and are slow, shuffling and pale.
And the number one reason you know it's finals time? You start compulsively counting down the hours until a) your next exam and b) it's time for you to escape.

(and yes, I wrote this while trying to avoid studying for Philosophy)

Until next week,
Me

Hey peeps,

As you may have guessed from the title, I'm finally back at school. Can't say I'm happy to be here - I have 2 exams in the next 4 days, which means I get to read 2 textbooks in full, consolidate a full semester's worth of notes for 2 classes, and study 100+ German verbs, 400+ vocab words and a crapload of grammar. Not fun.

And before you say anything, I did start studying while I was at home. However, I had video games (Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword looks AMAZING on a 10-foot screen, by the way), a Secret Santa gift (which took almost a full day to prepare) and a wiener puppy to distract me there. Here, though, it's just me and my textbooks. Also my computer, which is an excellent procrastination tool.

Yeah, I'd better hit the books again.

TTFN,
Moi