I think the universe is telling me that I'm not destined to drive because:

01. When I went to get my permit, I forgot some identification requirement and ended up waiting hours longer than I had to.
02. The moment I woke up today, it began to rain.
03. The moment I woke up today, I clutched my stomach in pain. Cramps. Lovely.
04. When I went to do my driving test, I ended up at the wrong MVA and fell into a state of panic as my dad rushed me to the right one.
05. I failed my driving test.

But luckily, I extended my permit by a year so now I have another 365 days to humiliate myself behind the wheel.

There has been no water in my building and in surrounding buildings ALL DAY.

This means:
NO BATHROOMS
NO SHOWERS
NO FAUCET WATER
NO HOT WATER

This means:
Going to the bathroom in buildings where your classes are
Running to the gym when nature calls
No drinking water at the diner
No ramen

And when the promised water comes back at 7 PM, it is disgusting yellow color.

I am so, so, so close to being done with this terrible week.

Bio test is over.

Chem lab has been conquered (but it was so terrible. I hate chem lab).

Chem test is over. (If you care, it was OK. The problems were predictably easy and the time was predictably short and my non TI-83 calculator is predictably retarded - the one problem I know I got wrong was because of a calculation error and not a methodology error on my part. EPIC FAIL, TI-30XA.)

Now, I just have my ridiculously late and long Honors Seminar to finish and a GEMS group team meeting, and I'll be gloriously free.



Also, when Obama was announced president, our campus exploded. People flooded the sidewalks and cheered and shouted. And the entire time, I was just thinking, please stop making noise so I can study for chem.

...I'm so lame.

Have I mentioned that I really hate Bio? 'Cause I really hate Bio. I studied so hard for this test (stayed up till 4:30 AM a;ldfjk;lkj) and then I confuse gymnosperms for bryophytes. WTF life. I hate mosses. There goes 10 points. So sad. :(

Also, chem midterm this Wednesday. Lots of math involving moles. I don't like moles. I don't really like math either. This isn't going to be pleasant.

And I need to get started on that English term paper. Um.

In conclusion, this week really sucks.


(By request, good luck, Rosie! ♥ And me.)

--

[EDIT]

By popular request (and by 'popular,' I mean Ani):

On Halloween, I did chem for 4-5 hours. It was ridiculous. Like, really really ridiculous. And the entire time, I was trying to rush through it so I could go down and watch scary movies with my friends. But luckily, once I finished at 10 PM (my classes are so ridiculous), I caught the end of Bloody Mary (oh Jensen Ackles, I come undone for you).

And then we watched Alien.

And then the Ring. Which, I would like to add, was really really scary. I mean, i thought I had built up an immunity to scary movies after Supernatural, but clearly I overestimated my skills. D: The little girl is so scary. Why are dead children always so scary?

Barbara was there (♥!), and she reiterated all the reasons why majoring in bio is such a bad idea. Which I've heard many, many times.

So I stayed up till 3:30 AM, and had to wake up at 7 AM (I have never woken up so early for college yet) for my service activity for GEMS100. I was grumpy and whiny, but our section leaders shoved some Dunkin' Donuts into us and we destroyed some trees, and it was fun. I was especially dorky since I started phylogenetically classifying everything. (Did I mention I hate Bio? 'Cause I'll say it again.)

...My life is pathetically boring.


Good luck, Noori on your calc and neuro midterms. ♥♥♥ Don't get distracted and work hard!

Well, I knew that I would eventually end up skipping Bio because it is too early, but I didn't expect to oversleep less than a week before our midterm. Fuck. :( I hate this class.

Some things I love about being 20 minutes away from home:

01. Being able to download music. Realistically, in huge school, I know that the Internet police is only looking for people downloading from Limewire, but still paranoid. If they took away my Internet, I might die.
02. When I forget stuff, it's really just a phone call away.
03. My PC. I love my Mac, I really do, but I can't play Roller Coaster Tycoon on my Mac.
04. Total privacy. Nobody bothers me in the basement, I can be as loud as a want, and no one looks at me funny when I drown pixelated people in computer games.
05. I'm not there long enough for my parents to get mad at me.
06. Dumplings. I miss dumplings.

Thorns
01. Bio midterm grades are getting posted Monday. D: I'm kind of terrified.
02. I'm behind on bio readings again. I just can't muster up enough determination to actually read the textbook.
03. Chem lab midterm coming up this Tuesday. Um. Chem lab. Midterm. I think that sums up my horror.
04. I thought I got over my cold (except for a few negligible sniffles), but today (yesterday?) I woke up at 5 AM having a coughing fit. =\
05. Tonight I went to a puppet show. The first half was about politics and world issues, etc., but the puppeteers tried too hard to be funny so all the jokes fell flat. The second half was a gay clown puppet humping/killing other puppets and then getting killed by his penis. Like. There was actually a penis puppet. And it bashed the other puppet to death.

Roses
01. abster226 is visiting tomorrow (or er, today?)!
02. Apparently, there is a pretty steep curve in chem. Like, an overall grade of 62+ is a B in her class. Except this curve happens at the very end when she's giving out final grades.
03. I watched Smallville and Supernatural with some friends yesterday. Smallville is so much better when there are people making snide comments in the room with you.
04. Just got back from a HOUSE MARATHON. House never gets old. Ever.
05. We might have another HOUSE MARATHON tomorrow because we only got through like 4 episodes today.

I'm kind of having a terrible day.

1. 77/100 on my chem test. Not exactly how I pictured starting out the semester.
2. Bio test sucked. He put on every memorization problem possible. The eons, eras, periods, epochs. The bacterial, archael, protist phylums. It was ridiculous. I kind of hate my professor.
3. I'm sick.

I could create a TV series about the amount of angst I go through for every test.

EPISODE 01: CHEM TEST

01. I've been studying for this since last week.
02. This is the most I've studied for anything. Seriously. I only crammed for a day for APs.
03. I really felt I understood the material, inside and out.
04. The questions on the test were totally reasonable.
05. There wasn't enough time.
06. I hate my non-graphing calculator. I was trying to subtract 28.48 from 29.19 and it kept telling me it was 58. Fuck you, TI-36.
07. I left two questions that were eight points each, blank.
08. This test is out of 100.
09. I hope there is a curve.
10. Please let there be a curve.

PREVIEW OF EPISODE 02: BIO TEST
(coming to LJ on Monday, when I've failed it)

01. It's on 10 chapters.
02. Each chapter has >20 pages.
03. We have to memorize certain groups of bacteria, archaea, and protists.
04. We have to memorize the eons, eras, and periods.
05. He tests on the most specific things.
06. Like things he doesn't even mention.
07. How does the QWERTY keyboard have anything to do with organismal biology?
08. (The answer: it doesn't.)
09. The class average is 60.
10. But apparently there is a girl in the class who does too well.

There's a convenience store on campus that takes Terpbucks (this is a clever way of saying money, but with school spirit infused in it), and it has AN AISLE OF SCHOOL SUPPLIES. I have >200 Terpbucks to spend by the end of the semester (and the only things I can buy with it are various food items that I can buy with my diner points). This is kind of awesome.

(What would be more awesome is if the bookstore with its CORNER OF SCHOOL SUPPLIES would also accept Terpbucks. Because their selection is so much more awesome.)



...If you haven't noticed already, I'm also a parentheses whore.

So all that reading that I skipped out on the first two weeks of school? Starting to catch up to me. I stopped understanding what the professor was talking about in chem, so I have to actually read the chapter in the book.

Also, my honors seminar? Way too much work. It's also consuming so much ink from my printer for readings, notes, and commentary. Commentary that should synthesize and analyze the information. She's actually making sure it's a cohesive essay! Ridiculous. :(

My English class is still incredibly awesome. Today, we discussed what a conversation would be like between an unmarried, impregnated woman in the 19th century and her impregnator, and we interpreted pedophilia from between the lines of The Turn of the Screw (by Henry James). Also, my professor has the best reading voice ever. It's fantastic.


Reason 8 Why Life is Made of EPIC FAIL

I went to open a checking account at Chevy Chase, and they had some trouble getting me an account because some guy had used my social security number to open a bank account. So I had to go to the Social Security Office to get my number verified and go back to the bank. BUT THEY STILL COULDN'T DO ANYTHING.

Chevy Chase: Go to the police and file for identity theft; go to court and fight over it; and then we can give you an account.
Me: But there's been no accounts of my SSN being used--
CC: Go to the police!
Me: But that's going to take forever. I have checks that will expire--
CC: Go!

So my dad and I went. To Bank of America. And they opened an account for me. And found no signs of this guy using my SSN. And my credit report is clean.

We went back to Chevy Chase to gloat, but the assistant manager's like, "I'm not making this up. This could be a serious problem. Here. Listen to this Voice of God. You'll see." So we listened. And we heard about this guy in Tennessee who opened an account in Alabama, which was closed because of non-sufficient funds.

We listened to his address. Multiple times.

My dad has that address in his hands now.

...I'm pretty sure the bank isn't supposed to do that. All of a sudden, I'm glad I'm trusting the privacy of my bank account information to Bank of America.

But still, I have to call to get a free credit report (just in case) and we might file for identity theft (just in case) and I have to get that record of Tennessee guy expunged from my ChexSystems record.

Title: 1000 Cranes
Series/Pairings: Tenimyu; Yuuya, Yanagi
Notes: For 31_days: September 14 / me, myself, I, and the space left for you. This is sort of part of the Parallel Lines universe (though reading it is unnecessary), except the discontinuity that Yuuya failed math in that fic, and Yuuya is good at math in this one. =\ I think I might have promised livingtea that I'd write this, oh, two years ago? Oh, also, angsty.
Summary: Yanagi is in a coma. Yuuya tries to cope.

( Yanagi loves bright colors )

GEMS100. Carl Burton & Ekta Taneja. M 3-4:30PM.
01. This is basically the class that helps me adjust to college life/Gemstone program (research thing that only crazy people will do).
02. It's led by a sophomore and junior who are awesome.
03. We do icebreakers. Lots of icebreakers.
04. We also play telephone charades, which is fun. (The rules are this: Divide a group into 2 teams. One team thinks up a word/phrase and tells it to the first person of the team. The first person must act it out for the next person on the team, but no one else on that team can look. And so on, until the last person in the line guesses at the word. The thing is, if one person in the chain has no idea what the person before was doing, then you're all screwed. Which is how dragon was guessed elephant. And skydiving was guessed elevator/taking a dump.)
05. Apparently, we can't escape icebreakers. Ever.

While I love GEMS100, my first Monday with classes was horrible. Since I have Bio at 9, I thought I'd just hang around/do my homework on that side of campus till my next class. So at noon, I went to English, followed by Chem at 1. Then I went to the bookstore to return a book (last day for full refunds), and ended up in line for ~40 minutes. By that time, I couldn't get my latelatelate lunch/dinner (lunner? Dinch?), and had to endure 90 minutes of hunger.

General Chem Lab. Jones. TA: Ye. T 3:30-6:20PM.
01. Horrible.
02. So, so horrible.
03. The TA doesn't seem to have any idea what he's doing.
04. The room is hot (especially under your labcoat).
05. We spent 90 minutes measuring water. That was our lab. Measuring water.
06. There are no stools.
07. Did I already mention it was horrible? 'Cause it was.

Title: Like Water
Series/Pairings: Eyeshield 21; Yukimitsu
Notes: For 31_days: September 6 / there's an art to this. In the Happiness for Now universe.
Summary: Football isn't as easy as it looks.

( There are a few things he realizes when he begins to play football. )

Japan's Silk Road Music. Yoshikami. W 6:30-9PM
01. It ends ridiculously late.
02. By the time this class rolls around, I'm already exhausted by Bio, Chem, and English.
03. The teacher is so fun. She is quirky and funny,
04. We are listening to a lot of old, classical music. I'm a pop kind of girl. This is not my style...
05. I'm disappointed we can't analyze contemporary J-pop.


My biology teacher is kind of awesome. Today, we had a lecture about evolution, and he starts off with an example:

"There are gray squirrels on campus. There are gray squirrels that look black and red on campus. There are white squirrels, though they are very rare. And then there is this: roadkill squirrel. These squirrels aren't able to produce offspring, therefore their alleles are not passed down."

Though, still kind of terrified about the preliminary exam. Because, uh, I never learned anything about plants or anatomy, and the cell biology stuff? Yeah, wiped from my mind when APs were over.

(Also, he has a Facebook. Which is kind of hilarious.)


My chemistry teacher is also kind of awesome. Today, we had a lecture about classifying Diet Coke, and somehow we diverged to the topic of testing pH. So apparently, next Monday, she's buying lots of Diet Coke so we can figure out its pH. (According to some girl in the class, it is more acidic than acid rain. T/F?)


In conclusion, I have lots of awesome teachers. Now, if only college didn't include testing, I think I would be all set.


Ways That Life Fails Me:
7. It is still ridiculously hot out. It is already September, world, please stop being 90 degrees outside.

Title: Happiness for Now
Series/Pairings: Eyeshield 21; Yukimitsu
Notes: For 31_days: September 5 / 3am on a school night. Also, first time writing in this fandom, so. Feedback would be great.
Summary: Yukimitsu Manabu has always been dutiful, but never happy.

( Yukimitsu Manabu knows this: the path to a secure future is to study hard and test well and enter a prestigious university that will pave the way for many job opportunities. )

Organismal Biology. Delwiche. MWF 9:00AM
01. The time sucks. I adore biology. I hate mornings.
02. This is the third in a series of bio classes that I placed out of thanks to AP. We have a preliminary exam on the subject matter taught in those classes. I haven't done actual bio since junior year.
03. He says that to brush up on aforementioned subject matter, read chapters 1-24, 50-55 in the textbook. Dying.
04. Delwiche is kind of awesome. Very informal, very blunt, very fun.

Introduction to the Novel. Auchard. MW 12:00PM. Th (discussion) 2:00PM.
01. I took this class because we get to read The Great Gatsby. I love that book.
02. The teacher is very cool. He says insane and quirky a lot. I love insane and quirky people.
03. We discussed the sexual implications of Little Red Riding Hood. Apparently, it's told to children because parents don't want their child to be raped in the metaphorical woods or preyed upon by sexual predators. Oh. And also, they'd rather we not fall for the bad boy (big bad wolf) and instead marry the surgeon/lawyer (woodcutter).
04. The first two readings are rife with sexual implications, apparently. I'm kind of excited.
05. I don't think I actually have to self-study for this class (besides reading the selected books). Which is awesome. I hate self-studying.

General Chemistry. Dixon. MWF 1:00PM. T (discussion) 2:00PM.
01. The teacher is enthusiastic and fun. That promises good things.
02. We have to read chapter 1 of the textbook. It's 32 pages long. I loathe textbook reading.
03. We get extra credit for signing her door. That's pretty sweet. I love extra credit. (I will need extra credit.)
04. This class is huge. The room is massive.

Chemistry Lab. Jones. T 3:30 PM.
01. I just downloaded a .pdf file that was 7 pages long and told me all the ways I could fail this class.
02. I hear labs suck. I'm not looking forward to this.
03. I hear the teacher sucks. I'm really not looking forward to this.
04. We have to buy so much crap for this class: labcoat, goggles, labbook, lock, 2 lab breakage cards. I have done a ridiculous amount of waiting in lines at the University Book Center spending ridiculous amounts of money.

I have Japan's Silk Road Music tonight, which promises to be easy if not fun. It's an honors seminar though, which means I'll at least have a small class so I can actually interact with people. Because I haven't really interacted with people in my classes yet, as they are large.

I also have my Gemstone introductory class on Monday, which promises to be fun because our team leader is really chill and awesome. Also, we're reading Fight Club, which automatically makes my section awesome (and apparently, we get to watch the movie, too). It might be the only class that doesn't have serious homework, besides writing journal entries (about life, not about research) and sending them to our team leader.


Ways That Life Fails Me:
4. I stood in line for like thirty minutes buying lab stuff. When I get to the counter, they're all out of locks.
5. I bought a labbook. Afterwards, I get an email saying I need one with alternating carbon-copy rip-out sheets.
6. It's ridiculously hot out.

Or, alternately, why life fails me:

1. First day of classes. My first class starts at 2PM. I forget my pencil case.
2. My first class (Chem) ends after ~15 minutes.
3. My second class (Chem lab) is supposed to start ~40 min after my first, so I wait around on some benches. Turns out, labs don't start till 9/8.

In conclusion. I should never have left my room today.

Moving In
Let's put it like this. There are over 4000 freshmen moving in this year. On both August 28th and 29th, it was alternately raining/pouring and drizzling. While over 4000 people moved in. So moving in early on the 26th, when it was sunny and warm and just, in general, a beautiful day? Totally awesome. (Also awesome: getting first picks in the dorm room.)

Floor
Each floor has a theme, and ours is Pixar. Our floor is the prettiest of our entire building. :) WALL-E! Also, everyone on it seems really nice. (Though I tend to linger more on the 3rd floor, 'cause one of my friends has a TV and a Wii and a closet full of cookies.)

Room
My room, I think, was supposed to be a triple, but we only have 2 people, so we have all this wonderful floor space. It's lovely. Although, our walls are white, so it feels a little blank and empty. My roommate and I are still trying to figure out how to make it more colorful and lived in. (Maybe it's 'cause I only live 20 minutes away from campus, but why do people need storage bins? I have absolutely nothing to store--I haven't even filled up my drawers. Is it because I'm not a clothes whore?)

Communal Bathrooms
I had these fears about communal bathrooms: sharing the bathroom with ~50 people means that I have to wait in line for showers/sinks; the bathrooms are gross. So far, the bathroom's always open when I need to shower and it's not that dirty. Though, there are only 4 showers, and only 2 have drains. Um. That time of the month is going to be so, so awful. D: AND. The showering experience needs some fine tuning because there is NO PLACE TO PUT YOUR TOWEL/DRY CLOTHES. It's like a balancing act, trying to keep my clean clothes clean.

Sleeping
The mattresses are so uncomfortable, and they squeak everytime you move. The first night I crashed at 11ish, and woke up at 4AM because people were shouting outside the building. At 4AM. I couldn't back to sleep till an hour later. Terrible. (But just by accumulating exhaustion, I was able to sleep well today.)

Gems Camp
I'm in this program for the insane who want to do more research and write 50 page papers, so we had some bonding time at this camp. The cabins were kind of crappy--the bunk beds were so close to the ceiling, and it was so hot. It was cooler outside than inside the cabin/room. We did icebreakers till we went insane--there was lots of forced interacting and lots of awkward touching. Case in point: the lava game, where we had 4 pieces of tiny red felt and 5 people had to stand clutching/groping at each other on each piece to not fall in the "lava" and lose the game.

Roommate
My roommate puts me to shame. She is responsible, neat, and operates on a normal sleeping schedule (wakes up at 7-8AM, sleeps at 9-10PM, has never slept later than midnight). But she's really nice, and now, if I sleep through my alarm clock, she'll wake me up!

iTouch
So cool. (Also, free.) *___* I'm kind of in love with it, though I need to sync it with my computer at home.

Diner Food
Um. Edible? But not so palatable. Also, it doesn't open for breakfast until school actually starts, so I'm kind of starving in the morning.

New Residents Orientation
Okay, they showed Iron Man for free in our campus movie theater. Enough said.

Internet
I haven't had my laptop for the past 3 days. This is why I've been rather uncommunicative. (I'm borrowing my roommate's laptop right now.) But my campus is entirely wireless, so once I get my Macbook, I'll be on all the time. :D The iTouch can also access the Internet. So exciting.

In Conclusion:
The experience has been mostly positive, though I always feel kind of sticky-sweaty (which is disgusting). Though I'm still looking forward to a shower at home. And also, kind of looking forward for classes to start because there is nothing to do at times.

Title: The Wisdom of Cats
Series/Pairings: Tenimyu; Yuuya/Yanagi, Yuuya's cat
Notes: If anyone knows the actual name of Yuuya's cat, I'd love to know.
Summary: He has gotten used to comparing Yuuya to a cantankerous cat, and the fact that Yuuya has upgraded from just bristling like one to sounding like one is hardly surprising.