looking up

it makes sense, if those are the only girls you've ever known.
but i'm just not that kind of girl.

today was our last day of class for the year. i feel so happy about that.
only my study group has hit yet another proverbial roadblock because once again another teacher has decided to be ridiculous. if i were you and reading this about me, i might tend to think that i just had a really bad attitude about everyone, or that i were somehow responsible for all of the problems that have arisen this year in some kind of way because this much bullshit just really doesn't happen in a logical world.
yet believe it or not, all of the crazy stuff that i have reported here this year has actually taken place. i remain optimistic about the outcome this time, though i have no reason to feel this way. here's to hoping...

on a good note, i officially got the stupid research class waived today. it took a lot of work and some real charm to get it done, but i did. thank you Jesus.

[note to self: no one cares about this crap.]
i am so tired that it's time for bed. mmmmm, bed.

(do entries of such poor quality count?)

i know i know i know

i need to update. sometimes it's just so hard...
tomorrow. i totally promise for reals. which actually means today for most of you, so hold onto your tophats. i'll be back in a jiff, whatever that means.

hot diggity

so i took the job. i think it will be good--and the parts that aren't will surely make good stories.

everyone else in my class is envious of the schedule, and also of the fact that i will spend a fair amount of time with hot med students. their words, not mine. all the paired ones want to live vicariously through me, all the single ones want me to get them part time jobs. i'm not entirely sure that they understand the job part. and also i'm not entirely sure i understand how most of the other people on earth work.

i should have been in bed nearly four hours ago. that never happens anyway, but also tomorrow is our last day of clinical for the year. we're getting out early and having a picnic in the park and our instructor is bringing her dogs. she's the best.
i can't believe the year is almost over. i'm amazed at how much we have gone through and endured this year... remember what a huge slobbering mess i was when i got here? i wouldn't say that i'm proud of my accomplishments, but maybe i should be.

i don't officially start work until june 20. my last final is june 4 and then i fly to chicago for my grandparents' 60th wedding anniversary. just so you know, that's more years than i've been alive. i am toying with the idea of going to new york city for a couple of days after that. any takers? i'm 27 years old and i have never been there. that seems wrong. and i want to see the moma before i die. maybe several times. let me know if you want to come with me, or if you have any other grand plans in which you want me to partake. i'm just looking for a bit of summertime fun before starting the grind.

snail tracks

i love being a student. i mean, i don't really enjoy a lot of the school part, it feels like busy work sometimes. but i love the schedule. and even with americorps things were so flexible. i could do what needed to be done when i wanted to do it, not between certain hours of the day. which was awesome because i got to travel when i felt like it, and get the summer off, and have so much freedom.

i'm thinking about this because the lady offered me the job. this is the point when i should cheer and be happy just like everyone else is when i tell them, right? but i don't really feel like it. i mean, it's a job in nursing. and it pays really well...
but it sounds like kind of a crappy job. she said it's super busy and stressful. and it's 8-5 m-f. (student nursing jobs are supposed to be three twelve hour shifts.) their staff is totally changing in july too, which she said makes it even more crazy around there right now because people don't know what is coming, and will make it crazy in july because nobody will know what's going on then. she is currently filling two full-time roles herself. i always want the thing but then fear the commitment. i just don't like to enter into things lightly.

i might be crazy.

i watched a snail cross the sidewalk on the way home.
it moved so slowly along its slimy winding path. but it got there in the end.
and also it only had one feeler.

long day.

there are some things in this world that are just plain wrong.
and some things that are so needlessly wrong.

12 hours is a long shift.
next week is my last week. i still don't have a job.

i will now find my bed and sink delightfully and exhaustedly into it.
slumberland usa.

you saw who at the par mo?

i love seeing people who are actually really good musicians. there is something very enjoyable about watching talent. even if it does come in sort of dorky, bizarre forms.

each of them played at least one instrument, many of which were traditional folk instruments. you've never seen so many lyras, bouzoukis, kanouns, udus, all in one place. you may have recognized the hurdy gurdy. the loudest of all was this tiny stringed gourd played with a bow. the musician was named something amazing like socrates mestaphales. he could have easily been bob cantoni. the one who played guitar was very unassuming, often hidden in the shadows or behind his hair. he was like a one man band of his own, rocking the electric guitar one phrase and the next playing a lovely melody on any one of the large stringed gourds. he got really nervous when they introduced him. i kind of loved him.

there was a dueling fiddle-bouzouki number.
and at one point she was jumping up and down with her accordion on.

celt rock.

i would never have paid for the tickets but really enjoyed myself. those might be the best. thanks, chad and erin.

white noise

i am so bored. i'm writing this really, really stupid paper. honestly, i am usually able to overlook the absurdity of most assignments and just do them, but this one is really just a big fat waste of time.

but i do get to use a quote from spiderman in it. i used this quote a couple summers ago when i led a talk with one of the summer work groups at good works. it was deemed "the summer's best," which is still a complete surprise to me. all i can say is it must have been God.

i wish i had a huge chocolate chip cookie right about now. it's the boredom talking.

but after tomorrow i'm pretty much home free. next week is our presentation--we get to stand in front of all 100 students and talk about circumcision. i really wish they had let me pick the topic...
and then a couple of tests. multiple choice. scantron. no biggie.
and then...
summer. dear, sweet, beautiful summer.

alright stop--paper time.

saturday update

today i was actually amazingly productive--an unfamiliar feeling for me. usually i have a longer list of things to do and less actually gets done.

then i went to see rent with some sweet girls. the sound was a little off way up in our poor man's seats, but it was enjoyable nonetheless.

and now, dear reader, i am tired. it's off to bed with me for a nice long nap.

2 long paragraphs and an ending

school! you are the bane of my currently pathetic existence.
what i don't understand is why our teachers have done this to us. why must they always make everything due at exactly the same time? it's just not right. and the really dumb part about it is, once we turn in everything else that is due for the quarter on tuesday, they have then made it completely unnecessary to attend their classes. they have made themselves redundant. (i just wanted to say redundant.) after tuesday we will only have 2 tests left, both in the same class. if i were a betting woman i would bet you all that nobody goes to class anymore. why should they? even when there is a grade at stake the material seems so pointless this quarter. my fear of skipping will probably keep me stuck in those terrible lecture halls anyway. but i'll show them. i'll write you guys letters and read fun books. i'm way behind on my fun reading already. (does the fact that i feel "behind" negate the fun?)

i have decided that i will never feel bad about doing nice things for people. sometimes when i do nice things for people i feel the need to justify it or explain myself to others. sometimes i feel that i have to explain myself even to the person for whom i did the nice thing, which then makes me question if i should have done it in the first place. a girl could drive herself nuts wondering if she should or shouldn't do a nice thing after experiences like that. but the way i see it, people probably just don't get it most of the time because people don't generally tend to do nice things for each other all that often. last year about this time i went on a secret good deed spree. i did a bunch of nice things for a bunch of people, and to this day i'm pretty sure only one of them ever found out it was me. i hope i never get too hurt or afraid to keep trying.

it's late and i'm rambling, so i'll leave you in peace now.

obligatory post

i don't really have anything nice or fun to say tonight, i just don't want to leave the same old post up for so long.

it was beautiful here today--sunny and 70 degrees for most of the day. and then i went inside and when i came back out it was 45 and looked like a storm was coming. only it doesn't really storm here.
and also this quarter simply can not be over soon enough. those people who really love school and stay in it forever baffle me. i do well in school and i will admit that i love the flexible schedule. although honestly, the flexibility just means that i don't ever do anything. i feel like i have the luxury of being lazy for weeks--but it always catches up with me in the end and i wind up hating myself during one final week of sleepless misery for not being more on top of things earlier in the quarter. but then it ends and i do fine, which just makes me repeat the terrible cycle again the next time...

bad habits die hard.

speaking of which, i have a midterm tomorrow and i should probably review things a bit. here summer summer summer...

history and future blaze bright in me

last year about this time things were just starting to get interesting...

last weekend i ran across this huge box of old photos from my past. it was like opening up the recesses of my mind and revealing my most precious and happy memories. i realized two things: 1. i love my life and i am so disgustingly lucky to have been able to know all of you and to do all of the things i have gotten to do; 2. if i didn't know me i think i'd really like to.

some highlights include: field studies, the centerville jazz trip to florida, my family at christmastime and other holidays and on vacations, western and the dread period, france in all of its various incarnations, good works times, americorps times, and last summer.

i think i'm moving into a new stage that i will be proud of too. the closer i get to nursedom the more i feel like it's a pretty rad thing to do. i kind of feel like i'm joining this secret club that is hard to understand unless you've been there. you become a different person through all of this--or maybe the things that never really fit anywhere else before are suddenly normal, acceptable. there is this whole universe of knowledge that you work so hard for so long to develop, and it is sort of nice to be around other people who get what that's like. it's a team sport.

also, i am remembering how much one person can impact your experiences. my instructor this quarter is completely amazing and our personalities work so well together. she is direct and upfront and honest, which scares everyone else but is exactly what i need. she makes us work so hard, but the crazy thing is that i actually want to. i know that if i put in lots of effort, she will make it all worthwhile. the harder i work the more she will teach me and the more i will get out of this time. i wish i could work with her for the rest of the program. or at least keep her as a contact for a long time.

this turned into a long one. thanks for reading friends, and for making life really super. i need to go to sleep now because i have to buy a wedding dress in the morning. night.

should i do it?

i went to a meeting tonight for the nike team in training. if i actually decide to do this, i will run a marathon through the streets of san francisco in october. the event is a fundraiser for the leukemia and lymphoma society, an organization dedicated to researching and caring for people with blood cancers. part of my job as a participant is to raise funds--lots of funds. so start saving up now, 'cause i'll be asking for donations soon.

it seems like a pretty awesome event and maybe a good way to do my first marathon? it does sound a little bit girly to me... and i think my physical therapist will yell at me for even thinking about it.
maybe when he's done he'll give me some money.

click here to find out more.

it is spring

the ice cream man was at the playground as school was letting out. i was on my way home from the bus stop, and i wasn't entirely sure it was actually the ice cream man because it didn't quite sound like the ice cream man i remember. it was like the ice cream man remix. play those funky beats.

what i call "the ash bugs" are back. hundreds of these little grey gnat-like pests swarm around in clouds in every shady damp spot in the neighborhood, which is really frustrating when trying to have a nice run. they stick to sweaty skin, but then as soon as you touch them they just fall apart as if they were composed of dust. they also have an amazing knack for getting into eyes and nostrils and mouths. sometimes i imagine they make the streets look something like how they did when mt st helen's blew up, all the grey particles floating through the air. it doesn't make me like them any more, but it distracts me from my annoyance of them.

we're all on the lookout for summer jobs now. i have applied at all of the major hospitals in seattle and i've heard back from a couple so far. we'll see. it would be really good to work in one of them, and i think i would feel really good about it. and they pay really well. which would be great--i'm getting very excited about the upcoming travels i will get to have.

i found out today that we have a whole extra week before classes start after christmas next year, which means i get to play in central america even longer. and don't tell anyone because if you do it might wreck things for future students, but they don't make us take finals during finals week there either. they let us out early because they want us to go explore. all of this means that if anyone wants to see some cool stuff in central america anytime between the end of december and the end of march next year, let me know. there will be ample fun to be had. i think i'm a pretty good travel buddy. (if any of you have any firsthand experience with this, feel free to let me know what you think.)