I had this realization a few days ago. College is not going to class for a little bit, hanging out, chilling, partying, sleeping 'til noon. NOT TRUE. It shouldn't be advertised as such either, by anybody. College is work. Getting up at 8:30 on a day you don't have class to get a head start on your essay and staying up 'til midnight because you have too much stuff to read WORK. oh well...that's why it costs so much, right?
Not that it's not interesting. I feel like a huge nerd in that sometimes I actually want to do my homework, read my book and everything. But at the same time, that's a good thing I guess.
~~~~~~
I had a meeting with my professor, JM, today, and it boosted my academic self-esteem, and personal ego in a serious way. She was meeting with everyone in our class today for 20 minutes about our essays due next week, and I was the last meeting for the morning. Right before me was the obnoxious know-it-all rich kid who drives everyone insane, including JM, and doesn't even realize it. She walks out into the hall, after he leaves, "Kate! (huge sigh of relief)" "long morning" "yes, but there's some interesting stuff here, so it'll get better."-- how's that for a compliment? I know out of context with who this woman is, it doesn't seem like much, but just the fact that she thinks its interesting, and doesn't rip it apart, is a good sign. woot woot!
~~~~~
I'm giving up seconds a the cafeteria for lent. It's going to be rough. I considered giving up coffee for lent, but then realized that I don't really wake up until halfway through my mug in the mornings, and that would be bad for the last week and a half of classes.
~~~~
I've come to really appreciate my roommates this week. They're not loud, obnoxious, or smelly. Our room is possibly the cleanest in this whole school (they inspire me to organize, but don't pressure!). Our room is a designated "safe zone," which means after 12 o'clock, and even sooner on weekends, no booze, no boys, no noise. Which is lovely and means home is always home.
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It's Cupcake's birthday tomorrow, Feb. 26th. Shoot him a feliz cumpleaños!
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Sunday, February 22, 2009
A Productive Weekend
I love the Oscars. I love the dresses, whether they're awful or gorgeous. I love the musical performances and the little clips they make of movie snippets. The announcers and their lame and not so lame jokes. The way the camera Always looks at the other nominees after the winner is announced, but they try to make it look unintentional. And this year, some specific things I loved: **Sean Penn's speech and the writer's speech for Milk-- though I haven't seen the movie, I want to, and these two men drove home just what a political statement the Oscars can be sometimes. **how Slumdog Millionaire won 8/10 of the Oscars it was nominated for. If you haven't seen this movie yet, GO. It deserved every one, and it made me so happy to see the huge gathering of people on stage for the Best Picture presentation/speech. **Heath Ledger's mom, dad, and sister's acceptance of his Best Supporting Actor award. They didn't cry, but made everyone else cry. It was very dignified, but humble, and just the right amount of gratitude and statement. **the musical medley-- what the heck was Zac Effron doing on stage with Beyoncé and Hugh Jackman? **Hugh Jackman's monologue...of sorts.
~~~~~~~
My weekend was so productive, I must say I thoroughly impressed myself. I wrote an 8 page research paper, finished a novel (of which I had 300 pages left on Friday), wrote an analysis of said novel, and I'm about to go finish up reading a book on the Ottomans. Like I said...I'm impressed with myself.
~~~~~~
On the other hand, I'm feeling a little like Meredith and Christina right now. And yes, I realize I just compared my real life problems to those of TV drama characters...but it's true! The first few seasons, when their characters were really developing, they established themselves as being "dark and twisty" as opposed to the "bright and shiny" Izzie. I kinda feel like that sometimes, I'm realizing. I wouldn't use "dark and twisty" as that infers some painful past secret that scarred me for life...maybe more like "gray and slightly curved." Or something like that. Somewhere in between that and bright and shiny. Sometimes, around all these happy hippies, I feel like a grump, but I know I'm not! I was even labeled by my roommate in a funny illustration on facebook as "the grumpy one." oh well...I feel like Meredith and Christina and I would be pretty good friends, so I guess I'm OK with that.
~~~~~
Speaking of Slumdog Millionaire, I just found out that the star, Dev Patel, is only 2 months younger than me...!!!! usually all those actors are at least mid-30s, but NO! Mr. Adorable was born in April of 1990...why can't guys I meet be that cute?
~~~~
I'm such a horrible daughter. I talked to Rando on the phone today for at least 10 minutes, complaining about my paper, telling him about my weekend, before asking how he life was, to which he replied "yeah, just got back from Mexico. It was fun." OOPS, sorry Rando.
~~~~~~
Overall, a good weekend. But tomorrow's Monday. We'll see how that goes.
~~~~~~~
My weekend was so productive, I must say I thoroughly impressed myself. I wrote an 8 page research paper, finished a novel (of which I had 300 pages left on Friday), wrote an analysis of said novel, and I'm about to go finish up reading a book on the Ottomans. Like I said...I'm impressed with myself.
~~~~~~
On the other hand, I'm feeling a little like Meredith and Christina right now. And yes, I realize I just compared my real life problems to those of TV drama characters...but it's true! The first few seasons, when their characters were really developing, they established themselves as being "dark and twisty" as opposed to the "bright and shiny" Izzie. I kinda feel like that sometimes, I'm realizing. I wouldn't use "dark and twisty" as that infers some painful past secret that scarred me for life...maybe more like "gray and slightly curved." Or something like that. Somewhere in between that and bright and shiny. Sometimes, around all these happy hippies, I feel like a grump, but I know I'm not! I was even labeled by my roommate in a funny illustration on facebook as "the grumpy one." oh well...I feel like Meredith and Christina and I would be pretty good friends, so I guess I'm OK with that.
~~~~~
Speaking of Slumdog Millionaire, I just found out that the star, Dev Patel, is only 2 months younger than me...!!!! usually all those actors are at least mid-30s, but NO! Mr. Adorable was born in April of 1990...why can't guys I meet be that cute?
~~~~
I'm such a horrible daughter. I talked to Rando on the phone today for at least 10 minutes, complaining about my paper, telling him about my weekend, before asking how he life was, to which he replied "yeah, just got back from Mexico. It was fun." OOPS, sorry Rando.
~~~~~~
Overall, a good weekend. But tomorrow's Monday. We'll see how that goes.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
a few fun websites
I was extremely productive/accomplished today. I got all my work done, then some, except for writing my next big paper, which isn't really due until Sunday ( i know, weird.). However! on my less productive days, I spend my time "studying" looking at websites and programs that sometimes interesting, sometimes funny, and often not super conducive to learning. Below is a short list of my favorite internet past times...
pandora.com-- make new stations by typing in random letters and picking the first artist/song that comes up
sadsteve.com-- free music. no seriously. free music. completely illegal. but still, free music.
steepandcheap.com and tramdock.com-- I've gotten better about not buying as much, but that doesn't keep me from checking them every 10 minutes!
FreeRice- they have subjects now!
Postsecret.blogspot.com-- changes every Sunday, super interesting and a great way to kill a bit of time
fmylife.com-- kind of depressing, but if you're feeling a little pissed off at the world, it'll let you see that you're life really isn't that bad.
cnn.com, bbc.com, npr.org-- read news. good for your brain. listen to npr morning edition at 11:20 at night, get a head start on the next day, and feel smart!
one last one...did you know that abc.com now has a full episode player of every show I watch! It's great. Grey's, Private Practice, and Bros&Sis...all right there. every Friday.
On a separate note, I wore my first official, completely hippie outfit today. my tie-dye shirt I made earlier this week (it turned out great!), jeans with holes, birkenstocks, a necklace made out of a tree nut, and a french braid. This inspired me to think about spring break, and how I should help all my state school/lutheran school friends in on the hippie fun over spring break...introducing--> hippie day! including tie-dye, simon & garfunkel, braiding hair, sunshine, and guitar jam sessions. I talked to SEK about it, and she agreed. most excellent! On the note of hippie-ness, here's my new favorite song for the week....no idea what they're saying.
pandora.com-- make new stations by typing in random letters and picking the first artist/song that comes up
sadsteve.com-- free music. no seriously. free music. completely illegal. but still, free music.
steepandcheap.com and tramdock.com-- I've gotten better about not buying as much, but that doesn't keep me from checking them every 10 minutes!
FreeRice- they have subjects now!
Postsecret.blogspot.com-- changes every Sunday, super interesting and a great way to kill a bit of time
fmylife.com-- kind of depressing, but if you're feeling a little pissed off at the world, it'll let you see that you're life really isn't that bad.
cnn.com, bbc.com, npr.org-- read news. good for your brain. listen to npr morning edition at 11:20 at night, get a head start on the next day, and feel smart!
one last one...did you know that abc.com now has a full episode player of every show I watch! It's great. Grey's, Private Practice, and Bros&Sis...all right there. every Friday.
On a separate note, I wore my first official, completely hippie outfit today. my tie-dye shirt I made earlier this week (it turned out great!), jeans with holes, birkenstocks, a necklace made out of a tree nut, and a french braid. This inspired me to think about spring break, and how I should help all my state school/lutheran school friends in on the hippie fun over spring break...introducing--> hippie day! including tie-dye, simon & garfunkel, braiding hair, sunshine, and guitar jam sessions. I talked to SEK about it, and she agreed. most excellent! On the note of hippie-ness, here's my new favorite song for the week....no idea what they're saying.
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Not a native...but I got here as fast as I could!
The url of this new blog, and the title of this post, comes from a bumper sticker I saw once on a subaru in CO. It was on one of those CO-license-plate-looking stickers, in response to the one that just says "Native." I thought it was super clever, and if anyone ever finds one of them, buy it and I'll reimburse you.
Besides just transplanting to CO though, at least for college, I feel like I'm not a native to any part of the lifestyle I'm living right now. Every day is full of brand new experiences and challenges, and, in the words of my prof. JM, "continuities and ruptures" with what I've done so far. But most of the time, I'm excited about them, and I really do feel like I've gotten to these points of rupture at just the right moment...basically as fast as I could!
As for the title of this blog...read this little bit from bible-history.com-->
"Jesus grew up in Nazareth, which was a very small village near the Plain of Esdralon in Galilee. After Jesus left Nazareth at the age of 30...There is no mention of Him ever returning back to His home town of Nazareth, but he was always identified with it (Matt 21:11), having been called a "Nazarene" which comes from the Hebrew root meaning "branch", in accordance with the promises made to David that King Messiah would be a descendant (branch) from the royal line of King David."
Right now, I'm taking a Middle Eastern history class, and one of the major things we looked at first block is social identity. It makes perfect sense to me that at that time, Jesus would be so clearly associated with his hometown, for all that he would come to be an international superstar son of God and everything. But at the same time, he didn't ever return there. He couldn't! He had too much work to do! I mean, I'm sure if he could've gotten a quick flight home for spring break or something he would've been all over that go to see father Joe, but it simply wasn't possible. He still loved home though, and nobody ever let him forget where he came from.
One of the last things my dad said to me before they left me at school, and for the first few times talking to my mom on the phone, they both said the same thing, seperately. "Don't forget who you are. Don't forget where you came from." That really struck home, as I feel like I've been tossed into this relatively small community full of people completely and utterly different than me. And not only that, whether it's a legit feeling or not, I feel like I'm a minority in a lot of ways of thinking and practices. So, I think I'm going to need some reminding of that idea of not forgetting where you came from while growing and changing at the same time...sheesh. That sounds freaking difficult. Wish me luck!
Besides just transplanting to CO though, at least for college, I feel like I'm not a native to any part of the lifestyle I'm living right now. Every day is full of brand new experiences and challenges, and, in the words of my prof. JM, "continuities and ruptures" with what I've done so far. But most of the time, I'm excited about them, and I really do feel like I've gotten to these points of rupture at just the right moment...basically as fast as I could!
As for the title of this blog...read this little bit from bible-history.com-->
"Jesus grew up in Nazareth, which was a very small village near the Plain of Esdralon in Galilee. After Jesus left Nazareth at the age of 30...There is no mention of Him ever returning back to His home town of Nazareth, but he was always identified with it (Matt 21:11), having been called a "Nazarene" which comes from the Hebrew root meaning "branch", in accordance with the promises made to David that King Messiah would be a descendant (branch) from the royal line of King David."
Right now, I'm taking a Middle Eastern history class, and one of the major things we looked at first block is social identity. It makes perfect sense to me that at that time, Jesus would be so clearly associated with his hometown, for all that he would come to be an international superstar son of God and everything. But at the same time, he didn't ever return there. He couldn't! He had too much work to do! I mean, I'm sure if he could've gotten a quick flight home for spring break or something he would've been all over that go to see father Joe, but it simply wasn't possible. He still loved home though, and nobody ever let him forget where he came from.
One of the last things my dad said to me before they left me at school, and for the first few times talking to my mom on the phone, they both said the same thing, seperately. "Don't forget who you are. Don't forget where you came from." That really struck home, as I feel like I've been tossed into this relatively small community full of people completely and utterly different than me. And not only that, whether it's a legit feeling or not, I feel like I'm a minority in a lot of ways of thinking and practices. So, I think I'm going to need some reminding of that idea of not forgetting where you came from while growing and changing at the same time...sheesh. That sounds freaking difficult. Wish me luck!
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