Things Change

Do you ever get bored with your space?  It happens to me quite frequently, especially when I have spent my year crammed into a dorm room with very few arrangement options.  Still, I get restless and feel the need the switch things up a bit, even if that means trying something a little unusual.

And last night, that's exactly what I did.

It's a little different, because it sticks straight out into the room in front of the closet, but it's weird enough to satisfy my need for something entirely different.  It also means that I have an entirely new wall space to decorate!

What's boring you in your life, friends, and what can you do to change that?

(Belated) Bay to Breakers

I have good news! My computer, which I thought was toast, is functioning again! The day after my dad and I dropped it off at the UCI repair shop, he got a call saying that he could come pick it up. Turns out they were able to turn it on, no problem, and they couldn't find anything wrong with it. So, while I may not know why my computer decided to crash for one day and then fix itself, I get to use it and it's working fine. And the best part is that I didn't lose any of my files! I'm now on a weekly backup schedule, just in case my computer designs to act up again.

I now know that you can never be too careful with things like this.

And now, as promised, here are some of my pictures from last month, when I went to Bay to Breakers in San Francisco. 

Justine loves America!

Thor, one of the first people we met. Looking back, he was one of the tamest!

Black Swan. It seemed to be a popular theme this year.

"Come on ladies, don't be scared."

SF's finest.

Uh, yes, that is a jersey made of back hair.

The Black Swans at it again.

Have a lovely week, everyone. And hope the sun finally comes out!

Happy Easter!

Wishing you all an amazing Easter! And (because I'm cool like that), here's a picture of an Easter egg as the famously bearded Giants closer, Brian Wilson. Or is it Wilson as an egg?

Thanks to Amanda Moore on Twitter for painting the egg and uploading the picture for all of us to enjoy!

That's What Friends are For

This has been a tough week. I've had so much work that for a few days, I literally felt like I was drowning, or at least having a hard time keeping my head above water. Then last night, Wade and I were hanging out, and I showed him some of the songs I had recorded on Garageband. This led to a whole evening of goofing around with the default tracks that come with the program, which we recorded in this little improv video. It was so much fun, and just what I needed to relax, but "singing on your feet" is harder than you would think!

The Great Flood

Tonight was a very nice night. My living-learning community put together a big Thanksgiving feast, and it was really nice. Then we returned to the dorms, and were hanging out in the hall when all of a sudden water started trickling out of the boy's bathroom. Before long, it had turned into this:

Poor Justine got stranded in her room! The nice thing about being in such a close community is that everyone genuinely cared about saving other people's rooms. We all grabbed extra towels and tried to keep the water from seeping into the doors of people who weren't there. The university was also very good about responding. The hall director was up on our floor within fifteen minutes, checking rooms for damage and keeping us updated on the situation. And the maintenance staff had the water almost completely cleaned up in just 45 minutes!

Thankfully, it happened early enough in the night that we weren't all trying to deal with it at midnight or later. Also, because to day is the last day before Thanksgiving break and most people are gone anyways, the maintenance staff will have plenty of space to deal with the situation. Hopefully they replace the carpet, because if not it is nearly guaranteed that we'll be getting mold. And one of the girls on the floor recently developed a mold allergy...

It wouldn't be college without at least a couple crazy stories to tell, now would it?

A Week (or two) in the Life

The past few weeks have been a lot of nothing but baseball, baseball, baseball! With the Giants in the World Series, there really was little else that I did but watch. Of course, I had a record number of four essays last week, so I was also staying up quite late and getting up early. To be honest, I'm just tired!

But the Giants won the World Series! What more could I ask for in my first year of college in San Francisco? I've been raised a Giants fan, so to actually be in the city when they finally won the World Series has been nothing short of amazing. Everywhere you look, there is orange and black. This was especially true on Wednesday, when the team had their victory parade ending at City Hall. I didn't get to go (I'm too dedicated to my classes!), but I had a few friends who went and you could feel the energy everywhere that day! Of course, every time I've seen a publication like a magazine or newspaper on the World Series, I've bought it, because this is a historic event and I want something to remember it by.

This picture was a request from my friends. Number 55, our starting pitcher Tim Lincecum, is my absolute-hands-down favorite player. The more games we watched, however, the more my friends became convinced that I look like Lincecum! So here, I am, embracing the look. My friend Justine has even taken to calling me "Timmy" when she's trying to get my attention. I don't mind - I could think of plenty of worse things to be called!

In other news, Sister Helen Prejean held a lecture on campus this week. She is the author of the book Dead Man Walking, that is more popularly known from the play and movie versions. She gave a talk on the death penalty that I really wanted to attend, but I couldn't due to a class. Luckily for me, Justine was willing to get my copy of the book signed for me afterwards!

The collage on my wall is growing slowly but surely. My plan is to have the entire wall covered by the end of the year, and it looks like that will be easier to do than I had originally expected!

One last update! I am now on Twitter! Yes, that's right, I gave in to societal pressures and joined yet another time consuming site. Actually, I had originally joined so I could follow a friend's tweets (Is that what you call them?) and decided it would be a shame to have one and not use it. So I am currently using it to record things that people around me say, whether they make me laugh, cry, or think about something differently. Feel free to check me out!

Have a good rest of the weekend, everyone!

Reflections in the Hall

The living community I belong to has a Catholic mass every Tuesday. Tonight, the presiding priest ended the mass with this lovely little poem by Richard Wilbur. I thought I'd just share it with all of you.

Right now, while we are finishing up some homework, my roommate and I are also waiting up with the girl next door. Her roommate has started making a habit of bringing random soccer boys back to their room late at night, and then kicking her out of the room. This roommate has been occupied by her current boy for two and a half hours now. The most disturbing part? They left the door somewhat open, but we're all too scared to touch it.

Quite frankly, we just want to be there when the guy goes staggering back to his room. But at this rate we're going to fall asleep way before they call it quits!

I wish you all a lovely rest of the week.