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The other day, I left this “poem” on normalpsychogurl’s
facebook wall. I just had a random act of poetry…
I have been busy with school...
it's so not cool...
every night, I stay up late...
I hardly ever get a date...
it's hard to get up each day...
I don't get any time for play...
But if I ever want to take a vacation...
I better continue my education...
This morning, I woke up and decided it was going to be a
good day.
Last night, I’d already looked and saw that it was gonna
rain today, and was prepared for the worst. I got my clothes ready to go so I
could wake up as late as I possibly could.
I finished my PreCal hw that is due tonight just before
midnight at 12 something this morning, and left it next to the computer.
We have an interesting dilemma at home right now. I had to
leave my laptop at home every day the past two weeks, and I must admit it’s an
inconvenience at school, but I’m trying to buy a little time until I have time
to deal with the computer at home.
I often wait until late at night as it is to come home
because I find much more conducive environments to study within away from home.
So, split time share isn’t an issue, but because it’s not
larger than life, it’s scary to dad.
So, I’ve been checking out prices on a decent new desktop,
and it’s totally do-able at like $400.
My debt’s getting higher and higher, primarily because of
finance charges on my debt that had grown this semester, because I don’t have
mommy and daddy to pay for my books, like many of my peers.
But this morning, I woke up and decided it’s going to be a
good day. It was going to rain, and I’ve got plenty going on, including a full
time work schedule that is definitely taking its toll on my body and mind, and
plenty of reasons to be stressed/worried/exhausted…
I got up, said good morning to all my children (cats) and
started scanning in my hw to turn in today. I turned them into PDF files, and
put them on my flash drive, because I didn’t have time to upload the documents
to the online interface. I’d do that around 1:00pm today.
I wanted something to eat on the way out the door, so I
looked in the fridge and found some pineapple that I’d cut up not too long ago…
I took that… I was honestly quite surprised it was still there, because any
leftovers in the fridge is generally free game, and dad usually eats it.
I got to the door and thought to myself, “crap, I have no
fork…” I went to the silverware drawer, and much to my dismay, all the forks
were dirty, and not there. There wasn’t even a plastic fork from a takeout
dinner…
So I grabbed a pair of chopsticks out of the drawer, since I’m
the only one at home that knows how to use them.
I mixed my normal pomegranate-cranberry/orange-strawberry-banana
juice cocktail. It’s like 4 servings of fruit, a ton of vitamin c, not to
mention the anti-oxidants…
I stepped outside to a pretty nice day, and got in the car,
which was completely covered in morning dew, as is normal for 7:15 in the
morning.
I was happy to be in my car, which I had gone through to
clean up the junk last night, so all that’s on the backseat is my homework. I
was grateful remembering that carmax took my credit when no one else would, and
that I finally had a car to call my own.
I hit the road, and plugged my ipod in. I was grateful that
I can put my entire cd collection in my pocket now… and I turned it up.
I drove past sharpstown, through Bellaire, and got to 610.
As always, there was at least one person pulled over on the south loop, and I
was grateful that it wasn’t me…
(Like I would ever get pulled over…)
I exited cullen, cruised through the geto (they can’t spell
ghetto there), and appreciated that there are people in much worse situations
than I am.
I continued up Calhoun, past all the greek housing, and to
my wonderful parking lot.
The welcome center is nice, and the admission experience
sucked, but I am grateful that I was admitted and was permitted to attend class,
and haven’t even worked the financial stuff out yet.
I stopped, pulled out my chopped pineapple, and went to town
on it. It was delicious. I finished my juice, and noticed a classmate pull up
behind me. We walked to class discussing how hard it was for her to find a
roommate to move downtown with. I was grateful that I don’t have that burning
desire to escape home.
I got to class, and took my normal position near the rear of
the room. Prof. Jim Wortman began his lecture promptly at 8:30, as he always
does. I was grateful that I had fellow first semester transfer students in my
midst, to suffer through this class with me.
I am a little worried about what he’s going to test us on,
but I am grateful for his bits of wisdom in his tirades and lectures about
using the college experience to better our lives…
(Roughly paraphrased…)
“Never strive to be average, what the hell would you do that
for? The young lady that spoke a while ago brings up a good point. If you set
your goals high and fall short, that’s okay, you’re still doing pretty well… If
you’re striving to be average, the company you’re going to be with is the best
of the worst and the worst of the best. Is that really the company you want?” --James Wortman, Prof. at CNHC of Hotel/Rest.
Management
So he let us out of class early, so that we might get
breakfast tacos just outside the classroom.
Georgina, Tina, and I all
grabbed a breakfast taco and a seat at a small table. We discussed my
girlfriend and what’s going on in my life right now. As we were, a well dressed
gentleman walked up to the table and asked us how the semester was doing and if
we had any questions…
(I had no idea who he was… I’d read on our e-mail
subscription that a lunch with the dean was scheduled, but I’d dismissed it as
I was going to be in class while it was going on…)
I said, “I’m sorry sir, I don’t mean to be rude, but I’m a
new student here, and I honestly don’t know who you are.”
I figured this was another professor, or a random speaker
waiting for his appointment, but it was not, it was the dean of the college.
The dean of the college came explicitly to my table of three, to ask if I had
any concerns or questions…
And I didn’t, so I told him how happy I was with my
experience so far. He asked if we knew all about what was happening at the
college, and Tina, very matter-of-factly asked, “So what is going on at the college?” The answer was a load of the business
end of the happenings at the school, including the renovations to the hotel,
some prototype rooms in the south wing, and gifts from the alums to improve the
Hilton library and computer labs.
He also discussed that we would be cooperating with the
college of architecture in development of these prototype rooms, and moving
towards an entirely student run hotel.
Seeing my opportunity to show interest in the discussion, I
asked if we would be partnering with other colleges in our research and
improvements…
We’ll be joining the college of psychology to understand the
needs and desires of the common person, and college of arts on what kind of art
works in the rooms, and these kind of things…
Cool. So we thanked him for coming to talk to us, and we
headed to our next classes.
I walked into History and sat in my normal place, 6th
seat in on the 9th row of the center section of the 450 seat
auditorium, a few chairs down from the studious redhead. (she seems so, anyway…)
He started lecture, but did something a bit peculiar. He
covered up most of the outline, which was different than normal, because he
usually left the whole outline showing, I could copy it, and then add details
in on the rest of the page.
Sure enough, something was different about today. We had our
first drop quiz, and I have not felt so prepared for a school assignment in a
very long time. It almost felt like cheating looking at how well prepared I
was.
Last night, Lauren had asked if I was coming over, and I
told her the only way that was happening was if I was permitted to focus
exclusively on my hw and studying.
I tore that question about progressivism up. I expect
nothing less than a check. A check + would be nice too… (why would you ever
grade like that, why can’t you just use numbers…)
I was grateful that I was so prepared. I was also grateful
that my knowledge of the history of railroading has paid off to this point,
because it helps fuel my understanding of the time period and the history… and
heaven forbid… I’m actually interested!
I headed out after class. I went to the UC, where I normally
eat lunch, got my wendy’s 10 pc chicken nuggets and chili. I have asked for
cheese and onions in my chili every time I’ve gone there since school started,
but today was the first time I got it, and I was thankful.
I finished lunch, stepped into the UC arbor, and looked
outside, where it was POURING RAIN SIDEWAYS… and I was grateful that at least I’d
never had any property damaged from a flood.
So I went downstairs into the gameroom, saw a couple playing
table tennis, and asked to cut in and play just a quick game to 10. My new
friend Gabriel and I took it down to 9-7, and he guffed his serve, but I told
him I don’t like to win on a serve, so we played it out and he went on a streak
and won. It was cool. I thanked his girlfriend Rosa
for letting me cut in, and let them get back to it.
Then I went and bowled 2 games… I got like 30 minutes of
entertainment for less than $4. I bowled a 127 and a 111, which isn’t great.
But I was thankful that I could do things like bowling and table tennis.
I went to UC underground, where I inquired about a board
game club, and it doesn’t exist, so I asked what it would take to start such a
club, and she gave me the paperwork and answered all of my questions. Now I
just need to find two other people to found the club.
I am in the Anderson
library right now, typing my 4th page in word for this entry. I am
grateful that I’ve learned computers so well that yesterday’s class in
technology was a total waste of time (discussing the contents of a computer,
CPU, RAM, ROM, etc…)
I am headed for English. I’m not incredibly thankful for 5
page papers due on Thursday, or my boring monotonous professor. I am thankful
for my compositional ability that should be good enough to trudge through it.
I’ll catch y’all on the flip side, keep reading…
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