Hi all,

Holy crap, it's been more than a month since I last posted. Sorry about that! My life is very much that of a typical student right now: I'll have absolutely nothing going on for a week or so, then all of a sudden there will be assignments to work on, readings to do and general chaos everywhere. Rinse and repeat every few weeks.

It's odd; it feels like I have nothing and everything to tell you guys (read: the 3 of you that actually still keep up with this), so I'll just give you updates of whatever comes to mind right now, stream-of-consciousness style. Apologies if you can't keep up!

Classes are going fairly well - I have 2 electives and 3 straight-up translation classes this semester. No evil profs, except potentially the translation prof who has a TON of random guidelines for us to follow on assignments. I literally have a half-page (and growing!) list of dos and don'ts, most of which are along the lines of "Prof HATES the word 'get'!" and "No gerund constructions". It turns translation into more of a puzzle than it needs to be!

In case anyone *doesn't* know yet, I also finally have a boyfriend! We met online on a mental health forum back in February/March, and started chatting as penpals. It continued that way for a while, until I finally told him that I was starting to see us as more than friends. He agreed, and a week later he told me he loved me!
The only issue is that he lives in England, so it's a long-distance MSN thing for now. Although he's planning to visit me in January!!

On a similar note, I've been making a fair amount of progress with my mental health. The counselor I've been seeing has helped me recognize my thought patterns and areas I really need to work on. She's also helped pull me out of a depressive episode before it got too serious, which has never happened before. It was kind of an eye opener for me!

... And that's about all I have to say for now. Stay tuned for the next episode in the soap opera that is my life!

Moi

Hi all,

So I'm finally starting to settle in to the new apartment. It's amazing - like living in a hotel. We have a pool, saunas, an exercise room and a movie room! And in the apartment itself, we've got 2 bathrooms and a freaking dishwasher. I have to say, it's one HECK of a lot better than living in res! Of course, we're still trying to figure out what we do and don't have; usually we find out we're missing something when we need it. So there's a lot of improvising going on.

The only thing that's not going so well at the moment is The Roommates. They've been doing a lot of frosh stuff this week, so we really haven't gotten to know each other that well. Despite trying to draw up a Roommate Agreement of sorts, we're still trying to figure out who should be responsible for what and what is/isn't acceptable. It's kind of awkward...

On the bright side, school is going fairly well. I ended up switching a bunch of classes around, so I'm now taking 3 translation courses (all in the same un-air-conditioned room, I might add), a Feminism class and a Medieval Studies class. So far most of my profs seem pretty decent, although I can see that my English prof treating us like we're in Grade 2 will probably get old fast. This woman (who looks like Mrs. Doubtfire, no joke) has already told us that "Spelling in English is hard" and asked us to name the advantages and disadvantages of working together in a group; you can only hear so much of that before someone snaps.


So yeah, that's more or less what's been going on with my life right now. Not sure when I'll post again, since I'm sensing an impending homework avalanche.

Moi

Hi guys,

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. Blogspot really dislikes my phone, and I've been too tired from work/busy packing to go on my computer much before now. I am in fact still alive, though, and actually doing pretty well.

First, since I know people were wondering, I did in fact figure out my living situation. I have 2 roommates who happen to be friends - they confirmed that they'd be living with me last week. They're actually at the apartment now; I'll be joining them tomorrow. Even better, we have almost all our furniture. A couple was moving out upstairs and sold us most of their stuff, then moved it down for us. And finally, we should have Internet and TV tomorrow evening. It's a pretty sweet setup, really!

(I should mention that my grandparents have played a HUGE part in all this. I can't thank them enough for everything they've done to help make the move possible, not to mention easier)

So yeah. I'm currently "taking a break" from stuffing everything into suitcases. I have a whole suitcase full of clothes, plus 2 others that contain a mix of clothes, valuables, toiletries, bedding, books and stuff that can only be described as "random". My grandparents are bringing at least one more filled with pots and pans, cutlery, laundry nuggets and the like. In other words: HOLY CRAP DO I HAVE A LOT OF CRAP!

Other than that, I don't have a whole ton of stuff to report. My WeightWatchers plan has unfortunately kind of died, since I pretty much stopped using my computer this summer which in turn caused me to stop calculating/tracking my Points. On the upside, I'm REALLY looking forward to be able to control what goes into and out of the apartment and what I eat this year. Hopefully I can resist the urge to buy junk, which in turn makes it harder to eat said junk. It's kind of a "blank slate" thing, y'know?

*sighs* Guess I'd better get back to figuring out what I'm forgetting to stuff into my suitcases. I'll probably post again after this weekend, though, once I'm a little more settled into the apartment.

Moi

Hi guys,

Things have gotten kind of insane since I last posted. Most of the chaos has to do with housing - to make a VERY long story short, let's just say that I got ditched by the people I was going to room with next year because one of their boyfriends came and screwed everything up... after my grandparents were more or less locked in to an apartment that we wanted to keep at all costs. It's that nice. We're talking 1000+ square feet, with access to a pool, sauna, exercise room, BBQ and sun deck here! And it's right across the street from campus. The boyfriend felt that the price was too much though (even after my grandparents subsidized it down to below-average student rent rates for the city), so he basically backed out and took the other 2 with him, leaving me to find new roommates for September. Grr.

</rant>

The other thing I've been figuring out is my diet and exercise. Things are going really well on the exercise front; I'm starting to go on more and more "long" (around 15km) bike rides. I'm not expecting to do any races soon, but it's definitely a start and it gets easier the more I do it. Here's hoping I can stay in the habit!

The diet thing, on the other hand, isn't going so great. I'm still monitoring my points... which means I can see how consistently I'm going over my "allowance". Something needs to change, and I'm really starting to see that carbs are causing me the most difficulty. In fact, the more I think about it the more I realize how addicted I am to them. So I'm going to try to drastically reduce my carbohydrate intake over the next few weeks, mostly by watching how much sugar and bread products I consume. If anyone has any tips/ways to help me do this, please share!

Ciao for now,
K

Hey guys,

Sorry I haven't been posting. I'm kind of swamped between my 2 jobs; I've been working an average of 42 hours every week (and that's not counting the 2 "extended" Saturdays I've worked so far). Honestly, it's kind of a love-hate thing so far. On the one hand, I mostly enjoy both jobs and the money is really going to come in handy next year. On the other, though, I'm spending an awful lot of time and energy at work. It leaves very little time for, well, life. And that kind of sucks.

Another side effect of my insane schedule is that I'm not really caring for myself as much as I should be. I have no time or energy for exercise and I end up eating out a lot at work, just out of convenience. That stops now. My grandpa challenged me to start counting my WeightWatchers points, and I've been doing it for about a week now. I'm still having trouble with portion control and have been a few points over my "allowance" each day, but overall it's going well. It gets me thinking about what's going into my body and gives me some direct feedback, which is nice. And hopefully, it'll help me lose some weight!

The other part of my get-healthy plan is that I'm going to set exercise goals. I'm starting off really small; my first goal is to exercise at least once a week for the next month or so. Even if it's just a really long walk with my dogs or a bike down to the grocery store, I need to get moving. It would be awesome if someone could hold me accountable at first; anyone feel like nagging me?

I know this is a short post, but it's almost 11 here and I need to get to bed. I have to be halfway across the city and able to deal with kids at 9 AM tomorrow.

Ciao for now,
Me

Hey peeps,

No, I haven't forgotten about you. Life's just been a little nuts since I got back. I started a full-time internship about a week after I got back, and my system REALLY hates the whole "getting up at 6:30 so you can work for 8 hours" thing. Don't get me wrong, I love the job (I'm translating/helping with school programs/doing whatever needs to be done at a children's museum here). It's just... insane.

So of course I decided to go back to my old weekend job doing birthday parties at an animal shelter. Bye-bye free time, but hello money! Hopefully I'll have saved enough by the end of the summer to pay most of next year's rent. Provided we can find an apartment, that is...

Yup. That's right. I have 2 roommates lined up, but we have nowhere to live. If anyone knows of a cheap place to live in the nation's capital, I'm open to suggestions! Provided, of course, that rent is less than $800/person with hydro.

So that's my life in a nutshell. Sorry for the short (and uber-late) post, but it's my bedtime.

Me

Hey guys,

So I'm officially 3 days away from finishing my first year of university. It's kind of bittersweet, really - while I am incredibly excited to go home and see my family (and take full advantage of real food/a clean kitchen/free laundry etc.), I'm going to miss my friends like crazy. I promise I'll write about that next week, but I don't want to start the whole "I'M GONNA MISS YOU GUISE" thing just yet because I've still got 3 days to go and I really don't need to be a bawling mess the entire time. Instead, I've composed a list of things (in no particular order) that my first year of university has taught me.

1. Keep track of your deadlines. The panic that comes with the realization that you have an assignment due in 5 minutes is just not worth it.

2. On a similar note, procrastination is a really bad idea. Studying an entire semester's worth of notes the day of the exam will get you nowhere.

3. There is no shame in taking advantage of free stuff.

4. It's OK to ask for help.

5. If you make a mess, clean it up! It's really pretty simple, but when it doesn't get done the results are often disgusting and/or dangerous.

6. A lack of privacy can be both a blessing and a curse.

7. Don't be afraid to share your struggles. You'd be surprised at how many other people are dealing with the same thing.

8. It's always better to do something than to do nothing. Even tiny actions can have a huge impact.

9. Don't judge a book by its cover.

10. Sometimes, you just have to improvise.

K