Traditionnnnnnn, TRADITION!

I'm finally home in Eastern PA, and it feels SO good. It's really nice to have a break and to get to hang out with the fam for a month. =) Speaking of, we've gotten 2 Christmas traditions in the books so far this year!

The first started when I was maybe ten - my mom, dad, younger brother, and I used to pile into the car and drive to a place where we could walk around, find a tree, cut it down, and take it home. Then the place got too expensive or closed down or something like that, and we had to find a different tree supplier. So we began what would become a Christmas tradition:

We took our little red wagon,

(similar to this)

pulled it down 2 or 3 blocks to the local bank where the Little League was selling trees, picked one out, put it on the wagon, and pulled it back home. This tradition is one of my favorites because of the time spent as a family and hearing my dad tell stories about when my brother and I were younger and he used to pull us to the bank in the wagon every Saturday morning. I also can't quite get over the tree vendors' faces when they ask us which car is ours and we point to the wagon!

The other tradition I love is making Christmas cookies. Now for my mom's side of the family, cookies practically require a NCAA bracket to figure out. My mom and her two sisters each make about 3 different kinds of cookie, their sister-in-law makes another one or two, and my grandmother makes at least 2 desserts and any other cookies they've forgotten. The kicker is, they never all seem to make the same 3 kinds every year. (Personally, I don't understand why they don't just keep it the same, but hey. That's their thing.)

Anyway, the one constant variable when it comes to cookies in my house is cutouts - the sugar cookies you decorate any way you want. They aren't necessarily my favorite to eat (that honor falls to peanut butter cookies with Hershey Kisses in the middle - "boobies," I just learned, is the technical term), but they are by far my favorite to make. We have your normal cookie cutters like Christmas trees, gingerbread men, ornaments, stars, and hearts, but we also have the "Christmas bunny," and "Christmas shamrock" - throwoffs of less cookie-driven holidays - and new this year...the Christmas unicorn! I get pretty into my decorating, prompting (usually) joking cries of "The oven's on but there's nothing in ittttttttttttttttt!!" This year, a certain theme permeated the festivities...

=D (credit to bro for the Deathly Hallows cookie)

YUM. Christmas Day, however, is when the real cookie smorgasbord begins!

[Also! Total lunar eclipse begins in ~1 hour! Who's gonna be up to watch it?? ....oh okay. probably just me. =) ]

I AM DONE.

Done with finals!!!!! DONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! DONE FOREVER (until next semester)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I SURVIVED!!!!!!!!

DONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Words cannot express my ecstasy!!!! The world has never looked more beautiful than it does today.

This must be what getting out of prison feels like! (except, you know, nothing like that.)

....did i mention i'm done? :DDD

Halfway there!

Finals List:
--> 5 page marsh/tire plant paper, plus group work reflection due Monday at 9am [STATUS: COMPLETE!!!]
--> 8 to 10 page Buddhism paper, due Monday at 3pm [STATUS: turned in 3 hours late but COMPLETE!!!]
--> Study my brains out for Chem final, Tuesday at 9am [STATUS: will commence studying at midnight]
--> Create a map of the best place in Erie, PA for an urban garden and write 3-4 pages about the process, due Wednesday at noon. [STATUS: ~ 1/4 done]

2 down, 2 to go!!!!!!! I can do this!!!

I would quote the infamous Bon Jovi, but I'm sure you'd roll your eyes as much as I would. 

Roomie showed me this as last night I was in despair =]

Finals List:
--> 5 page marsh/tire plant paper, plus group work reflection due Monday at 9am [STATUS: COMPLETE!!!]
--> 8 to 10 page Buddhism paper, due Monday at 3pm [STATUS: ...well...I have a heading?]
--> Study my brains out for Chem final, Tuesday at 9am [STATUS: still ahhhhhhhhhhhh]
--> Create a map of the best place in Erie, PA for an urban garden and write 3-4 pages about the process, due Wednesday at noon. [STATUS: ~ 1/4 done]

Just keep swimming, just keep swimming....

:| (that is my face.)

24 hours later and I'm only halfway done with my ES paper. Waaaaaayyyy behind schedule. Meh. Oh well, I might not sleep tonight but this time tomorrow I'll be halfway done with finals altogether! YAY!

Still To Do:
--> 5 page marsh/tire plant paper, plus group work reflection due Monday at 9am [STATUS: halfway done]
--> 8 to 10 page Buddhism paper, due Monday at 3pm [STATUS: not started]
--> Study my brains out for Chem final, Tuesday at 9am [STATUS: ahhhhhhhhhhhh]
--> Create a map of the best place in Erie, PA for an urban garden and write 3-4 pages about the process, due Wednesday at noon. [STATUS: ~ 1/4 done]

Peace out, blogspot. I've got some serious shit to do.

Cold day + warm latte in a coffee shop with my roommie = WIN

Yesterday was a fantastic day!!! The breakdown:

• Played Quidditch with half of the women's rugby team 
• Walked downtown for a debate 
• Drank coffee
• Went thrifting and got a bunch of FREE warm sweaters
• Took the bus back up to campus
• Went to an awesome play
• Wrapped Secret Santa presents
• Went to a Christmas party where my secret santa LOVED his present =DDD
• Got a giraffe from my secret santa
• Chatted with friends into the wee hours of the morning.

Phew. Well, I've had my fun and the next 4 days are all about work. Now I'm sitting in a coffee shop downtown with my lovely roommate, waiting for our food and doing social internet things before eating lunch, chatting, and then delving into the pile of work I have to do for finals.

Goal for today: Write a 5 page paper about the potential effects of a tires-to-energy plant on the wildlife of the neighboring marsh for my Env. Sci. class, due Monday at 9am

Still to do:
--> 8 to 10 page Buddhism paper, due Monday at 3pm 
--> Study my brains out for Chem final, Tuesday at 9am
--> Create a map of the best place in Erie, PA for an urban garden and write 3-4 pages about the process, due Wednesday at noon.

GO. 

My Fool

"I must learn to love the fool in me - the one who feels too much, talks too much, takes too many chances, wins sometimes and loses often, lacks self-control, loves and hates, hurts and gets hurt, promises and breaks promises, laughs and cries. It alone protects me against that utterly self-controlled, masterful tyrant whom I also harbor and who would rob me of human aliveness, humility, and dignity but for my fool."

~Theodore I. Rubin, MD

WOW. I can't even begin to describe how much I adore this quote and how well it sums up my life. It just makes me so happy. SO happy!!! To use a cliche, my emotions have been on a roller coaster ride the past couple days, and to see this quote that so perfectly sums it all up, puts things in perspective, and makes me feel wonderful is just a great big dollop of icing on the cake. A good cake. The kind you want seconds and even thirds of.

I LOVE LIFE. And I'm learning to love my fool. =]

Money money money - must be funny - in a rich man's world.

Let me preface this post up front: I am a nerd, and proud of it.

As such, it should come as no surprise that I am vice president of my college's chapter of Dumbledore's Army, a chapter of the Harry Potter Alliance, an organization that does charity work in the name of Harry Potter.

This is our first semester as a real club, and we have a VERY modest budget of $150 for the semester. (Though I feel fortunate that our college gives out money to student organizations at all.) December was drawing near, and the club decided to spend our budget on a Yule Ball, a la Goblet of Fire.

I was in charge of decorations committee for said Ball, and the arctic tundra that has become Meadville, Pennsylvania prevented our committee from going decoration shopping until the day of. That, and the fact that a friend and I had to dig the car out from 2 feet of snow, push it out of the parking space, and then jump it using a different friend's car and a third friend's jumper cables. GAHHHH.  o.O

To put it mildly, today was a hella hectic day spent finishing up classes, jumping my car, and FINALLY getting out to the store and back with minutes to spare. Luckily, another girl on the decoration committee had been to Wal-Mart the previous day and got us a bunch of decorations.

So the Yule Ball came and went and was very well-attended, which made us extremely happy. I was on top of the world until our president told me how much the other decor committee member had spent on decorations. Combined, her receipts and mine totaled an amount way over budget without even factoring in the cost of food.

So now what do we do? We can't go to student government and tell them how much we overspent, because that looks waaaaaay bad on a fledgling group. I'd feel awful not reimbursing the other committee member because she's a sweetheart and helped out a lot, it was just a miscommunication mostly on my part that led to this mess. BUT at the same time, I don't want to eat what I spent and not get reimbursed either. DILEMMA!!!!!! 

In short, the solution is this: Fuck money. Let's go back to the barter system.

Well hey there.

Welcome to my shiny new blog! You can thank my cousin Renee at Closed on Sunday for encouraging me to start this. I think it'll grow to be a great place for me to voice my thoughts/musings/emotions/randomness (there's so much floating around in my head!) and I'm excited to get started! However, it's 2:34am and I still have on more day of classes to slog through, so my first real entry will have to wait (most likely until I'm procrastinating finals studying). Goodnight for now =)