We're getting a puppy!

Officially, my uncle's dog's yellow female puppy is going to be ours!  I'm excited in a sort of healing way I think.  I love Jazzy, and miss her, but I'm excited to meet Belle (as I'm calling our new puppy).  Here are some pictures of her and my aunt:

Cuteness!

So the puppies will be ready to go to new homes on June 1, which is the day after my graduation.  I'm hoping my parents will let my sister and I drive down to Iowa to pick her up ASAP.  

There's nothing like a puppy to brighten your day :)

Allergies SUCK

I keep sneezing!  It's all those darn plants outside having sex in the air, making me miserable.  UGH!

So this week has been interesting so far.  Interesting in the sense that not a lot has been accomplished, other than Sybylla's Sims neighborhood.  

I have started talking to my Evolution prof about going down to the Gulf of Mexico with him for 10 days on a boat (Oregon II) doing fish research.  It'd be purely voluntary, but they feed me and let me sleep on the boat and I'd get good field experience (something sorely lacking in my resume at this time).   The prof is super excited about it, and I mentioned it to my parents and mom seems semi-excited and dad seemed to be more worried about the male-female ratio on the boat.  But yea, it'd be from June 22-July 3 and my prof said it's great experience if I wanted to get a job as a fisheries observer.  Basically a government employee who goes out on commercial fishing vessels with a clipboard noting how much of which types of fish they catch.  A job!  Involving both marine and biology!  Not at Culvers!  Sign me up!    Had a meeting with the prof today after my Interactive Media class, and it sounds like it would be a good trip.

Earlier I decided to go home this weekend.  My aunt and uncle are heading towards Rochester so they could give me a lift, and I want to grab some of my artwork to show in the Art Minor show.  That and I'd like to start bringing some of my crap home.

So puppy!  Uncle's dog had puppies, and there is a yellow female up for grabs again.  Think dad really wants to, Megan and I do as well but mom and Sara seem to be more apathetic to the idea.  Which could be bad, since who knows how long I'll be at home to help out, and Megan will just be home for the summer.  But I miss having a puppy around.  I miss Jazzy... it's hard going home and not having her there to greet me and play with.  And like, do we use Jazzy's kennel for a new puppy?  Would the new one just inherit all of Jazzy's toys?  It just seems wrong somehow...  but it would also be wrong to let all that go to waste or to sell it just to buy brand new stuff.  Not sure how I feel about it.  I kept looking to my right as I was typing this, expecting to see my Jazzy drawing that is hanging next to my bed at home.  Think I'm a bit disoriented.

I had a dream about clones last night.  And never really knowing if it was the real person or the clone.  It was bizarre.

Been working on my "Fantasy" website and it looks okay.  Not quite what I originally wanted, but it will probably earn me a decent grade at least.  The prof keeps making suggestions that I don't like, so I smile and say "that's an interesting idea" and then just continue whatever I was doing.  The other day I was explaining one of my ideas and she just did not like it and kept trying to get me to agree to some of the changes she suggested.  I finally made that idea today, and she came up behind me and goes "that looks really good!"  I just wanted to say, "Yes, yes it does.  And do you know why?  It's because I didn't take a single one of your suggestions."  That would be mean though, and she's really nice.  Only trying to help I suppose.

Evolution.  Have a presentation on "Overhunting and Conservation Genetics in Whales" next Wednesday.  So far, my partner has done nothing to help me.  I looked up all the references, read through them and threw out ones that weren't any good, made the outline for "our" presentation that was due today, and even started working on the powerpoint all before she even responded to my first email in which I sent her the papers I had scrounged up for research.  She still hasn't read them.  So she has no idea what we're presenting about next Wednesday.  Grrr.

So in the middle of writing that paragraph Sybylla and I went to dinner.  Afterwards I stopped at the library to grab some books and movies for my Women in the Holocaust final research paper.  I got 5/6 books I wanted and two films (one on DVD one on VHS).  I just got done watching the DVD: Paragraph 175, narrated by Rupert Everett.  It was very moving, and I got to see one of the women I quoted extensively in my first paper.  That was exciting.  Now I just have to figure out how to watch the VHS... and since the movie is due tomorrow I'm kind of screwed.  I'll probably have to go renew it or something for the weekend.  Then I can watch it at home!  Hooray!  A rough draft of this paper is due next Thursday and I have to present this thing to my class in two weeks (along with handing in the final version of the paper).  

So for next week I have the rough draft and my evolution presentation.  And a rough version of my website is due on Tuesday, but I'm just leaving that as it is.  

I can't remember what else I was going to talk about.  I guess it must not have been that important anyway.  Other than to mention the fact that some of the problems I was experiencing over the summer are still issues in my life.  Which sucks.  

Thank you for reading this.

Darfur Week and Revolutionary Road

So this past week was our STAND chapter's "Darfur Week."  It was kind of a bust, no one on campus really came to any of our events (other than our Women in the Holocaust class).  Anyway, I went to our events and they were very informative, plus depressing.  

On Monday (April 20) Camp Darfur came to campus, which was basically a bunch of canvas tents covered in information about the genocide going on in the Darfur region of Sudan.  Unfortunately because of the wind and the rain they had to relocate to inside the cafeteria.  Apparently, attendance was dismally low.  Later that evening we showed a short documentary made by the University of Minnesota on the genocide, followed by a discussion with people who had recently been to the refugee camps on the Chad/Sudan border.  There was free pizza and the documentary was really well done, but only 2 people outside of our class came to it.

Tuesday my involvement with Darfur Week was in tabling, where I sat at a table outside the cafeteria and attempted to get people to sign a petition to Secretary of State Clinton to do something about Darfur.  Even though we had free candy, and all people had to do was sign a petition, hardly anyone bothered to stop.  Luckily I was only stuck there being angry at my campus for an hour, then I headed out to do homework and stuff...

Wednesday was Earth Day.  Yay Earth!  This was also the day of the big controversy.  So Proclaim (the Christian group on campus) had hired a Christian band to perform outside the campus center in celebration of Earth Day.  Apparently it was all going fine, until the band took a break from playing and decided to make a little speech.  The speech was about how he wished he could "purge our campus from the scourge of homosexuality."  What??  Yea, so that kind of talk doesn't fly well on this campus (for which I am extremely proud).  Other rude and offensive things were said by this person and shortly afterwards they were escorted off campus by Safety and Security.  Yay GAC!  Later that night we (STAND) showed "Sand and Sorrow," a more in depth documentary about Darfur.  That one had even less attendance, not even our entire class showed up.  But it definitely had us all in tears by the end of it.  

Thursday was a difficult day.  Thursday was our "Fast for Darfur" day, and while I'm sure no one on campus participated other than perhaps a few in my class, I did.  I stopped eating at midnight (Wednesday night) and didn't eat again until past sunset on Thursday.  I drank a lot of water, but its really not the same.  Especially since I've gotten back into my bad habits here at Gustavus.  I also spent a lot of time (4 hours) in the Confer lab working on mini-flash animations for my fantasy website.  Mostly I used the fun Photoshop pictures I made when I was working as a call analyst at Mayo.  I'm hoping my teacher likes it, but she seems to be very supportive of my stuff so far.  This is my final project in the class though, so I'm kind of nervous about it.  Anyway, so I spent an extra hour there after class and finally Sybylla called me.  She kindly reminded me that Heather (friend from Mankato State) was coming up today to visit and was patiently waiting there for me.  I felt like a moron for forgetting.  But we spent a fun evening catching up and me watching them eat dinner.  And afterwards we exposed Hebba to the wonders of CollegeHumor.com.  That was fun.  

Today, Friday, was kind of blah.  Went to work and had to hang up some butt-ugly posters for the upcoming play.  Honestly, the posters are like pure black with a weird guy's face in the bottom left corner (and his face is blurry and out of focus) and then the name of the play is in the top left corner in unintelligible script.  It's such a waste of paper, I wish they had let me design the damn thing.  So yea, hung those up, then went to my Evolution class.  The prof decided since it was so nice out today that we could have class outside.  That was nice, he even printed out copies of the powerpoint he was going to use for all of us.  Then I went to eat lunch, pick up the posters stamped by Res Life, and then back to the office.  Once I got there, I discovered it was shut and locked.  Luckily a prof was walking by and opened it for me, so I dropped off the posters and picked up the ones designated for more academic buildings, hung those up, and left work early.  Rest of the day was kind of a blur.  Since I slept terribly last night I decided to take a little nap, then spent a lot of time reading.  Later, Vicki Sybylla and I went to dinner and then to see the campus movie Revolutionary Road.  I really didn't know what the movie was about at all, other than the Titanic duo were starring in it.  Boy was I surprised!  We decided the moral of the story is to just go to Paris.  I don't think I'll ever find a burning desire to see that movie again, but it was interesting.  So we got back from that, came back to Prairie View, then Vicki got tired and left, so Sybylla's playing Sims and I'm updating my blog.  Just to prove how little really happens in my life I guess.  

The End.  For now.

I have a website??

So apparently Gustavus gives us students a website.  Just for the hell of it.  I wish I had known this as a freshman!  

So I posted my photo narrative on it, there are 28 different pages, good luck finding them all :P

My Australian Photo Narrative

Happy Pagan Holiday!

AKA Easter.  Its date is based on moon cycles... how can it not be associated with ancient pagan festivals of spring and rebirth? That is beside the point... 

Not that I necessarily have a point.  Actually I'm fair certain I don't have one at this point.  I don't have a point at this point.  Right.

Moving on...

SO after P-Ball I finally got more dedicated to my studies and realized how much I have to do.  And I have so much to do for practically the rest of the semester, which is not good.  For instance, this week I have my photo narrative due in Interactive Media, an analysis of a reading and my research paper proposal due in Women and the Holocaust, and my 3rd Evolution test to study for.  Which doesn't sound like a whole lot but when it's packed into the 4 days directly after a break... it's a bit difficult.  Not to mention that Darfur Week at Gustavus is next week, and as the co-chair of public relations I should be doing a hell of a lot more for that.  Gah.

So far I have finished all of the above except for the full on preparation for the test.  Actually, the only prep for that I've done is to read the chapters...  and the test is on Friday.  Which leaves me tomorrow to study for it, crap.  

I spent 6 hours on Monday working on my photo narrative in the Confer lab, that was fun.  At some point a guy in there had lost his camera's memory card and was so freaked out about it he asked me to help him look for it.  He was almost pulling out his hair trying to find it, but I found it in like 2 minutes.  That was kind of strange but hey, I was helpful.  And I finished my photo narrative - which is more like a random assortment of Australia pictures.  It's set up like a website, with one starting picture that you click on.  Depending on which part of the picture you click, you get sent to another page with about 6 pictures on it and then you can click any of those to get another page.  The pages all have themes, whether a certain pereson or event or part of Australia.  I wanted to convey that memory doesn't necessarily work in a chronological order but based on relationships between things.  So yea, I think it's pretty awesome, but I'm biased and I did spend hours upon hours working on it.  

Wow, I just spent awhile (30 minutes) going through it and making sure I could find a path through the pictures that shows all the pages... tricky.  

So that's done.  Now I have to start thinking of what I want to do for my potential website.  I need a one-word concept for it and of course I'm thinking of using "Fantasy" for my word.  It can encompass pretty much anything, and lets me do things I like doing (yay dragons!).  

Previously, I went home on Thursday after my Int. Media class (and frantically packing).  Didn't really do anything all Easter break, other than eat at Culver's on Friday (and refusing to give them my name to put me on the schedule that weekend), sell my extra camera on craigslist, and go on an Easter egg hunt in my backyard after attending church.  That's right, the "Easter bunny" aka my mom actually went and "hid" plastic eggs full of candy out in our backyard for the 17, 19, and 21 year old "girls." It was fun, even if I totally lost to Megan and Sara.  But they shared with me, so it was all good.  

Anyway, I don't know what else to say and I should be studying for my test, so hopefully I'll update again eventually. 

One year ago:  I was being lazy. Lazy and depressed via loneliness.  And wow, editing pictures for a photo project.  Crazy...

Good times.  

President's Ball

P-Ball.  The one formal dance Gustavus has every spring, that isn't actually held at Gustavus.  Not sure why it isn't, I'd think we have plenty of places for it, but that is besides the point.

I was convinced to attend this year.  I figure, it is my senior year and I probably won't have too many more opportunities like this again so I went with some of my friends.  

I guess I should go back and describe the rest of my week but I just didn't really do a whole lot.  Most of the week was spent going to classes and work and then mindlessly playing the Sims or rereading the Twilight saga.  

So on Friday (April 3) Sybylla painted my finger- and toenails with nail polish that freakishly matches my dress.  That night was also spent watching Iron Man and making a McDonald's/gas run.  

Saturday I got up, showered, and let Sybylla do my hair.  She did a bun in the back and then left two long chunks of hair in the front which I later attempted to curl with Sarah's curling iron.  That didn't work too well, mostly due to the fact that Sarah's curling iron is what she uses to straighten her hair, ie it's very fat and doesn't make curls well.  That and I'm not exactly an expert.  Far from it really.  Got some directions printed out, called Vicki to make sure she knew what time we (Sybylla and I) were coming to pick her up, packed up my camera and phone and some sturdier shoes in case of snow and hopped in the car.  

Went to pick up Vicki and then we headed up to the Cities, to the Nicollet Island Pavilion.  Once we got there we met up with Catie and Tamoko (foreign exchange student) and then waited for Sarah, Hannah, and Ryan to join us.  Once we got settled at a table, Anna showed up and sat at the spare seat at the table.  Dinner was delicious, but on the smaller side of things.  I had the vegetarian meal which was just a nice pasta primavera.  Vicki had the turkey, with mashed potatoes and vegies (I ate her potatoes... yum) and Syb had the roast beef.  After the dinner, there was the most divine cheesecake I've tasted in ages.  It was marvelous.  

Then the waiters cleared away some of the tables to reveal the dance floor and the band came on stage.  We went to check our coats and stuffs, which was a problem for some.  Where do you stash a ticket when you have no pockets?!  I ended up holding onto mine all night, along with my camera.  The band played music from the 50s-80s, so most were old but generally recognizable.  Whenever the band took a break, a DJ played very recent music.  We just danced in our big group of 8 and sometimes broke into smaller groups.  It was just fun, dancing with occasional breaks for water.

At the end of the night, we decided to head out a bit early (~15 minutes) just to beat the car rush.  It was around then that I realized that I only printed out directions for how to get there but not for how to get back.   Since there are a lot of one-ways downtown, that made it a bit of a challenge.  But we made it eventually.  Once we got out of the Cities, the rain turned into snow.  And then really thick snow.  

On the drive we decided to stop for some fast food, since the meal was not exactly filling earlier.  So we first stopped at Taco Bell for Syb and I and then at McD's for Vicki.  It was amazing because, even though I was driving, eating tacos,  and in a very nice dress, I managed to not spill any on myself.  Yet if I'm sitting at home at a table covered in napkins and eating toast I will manage to somehow stain whatever I'm wearing.  How does that work?

Anyway I'll close this off, there's really no awesome story to this, just sharing how my night went.