Halloween

Happy Halloween everyone :)

In keeping true to the Nanning tradition, I have moved on a holiday. I write this from a corner of my room, I'm sorry - I mean "studio" apartment. I have a cup of coffee next to me, am finally through unpacking for the night and am about to start working on some school work.

I like my little room. I'm lucky, it's the biggest one in the house and I have my own bathroom. I'm down in the basement and it's painted green. Freaking everything I own man is green, what the hell? What if I don't like green? What if i decided that I like blue....no one will ever believe me. My back pack is green, my car is green, my curtains are green, my new hand-me-down recliner is green, my bedspread is green, my raincoat is green, my placemat is green, my garbage can is green, my pillows are green.....*sigh* Lol it's awesome.

I got really lucky with this place and as I've been moving in today I've decided that, God permitting, this is where I'm going to hunker myself down for awhile. The location is perfect, I'm minutes away from ROTC and less than 10 away from class. My room is down in the basement so I can barely hear the rest of the noise in the house. Yay!

It's nice. I spent a little bit more money today than I was comfortable, but I got everything I need now to make this home. I went out a bought a mini-fridge. I got a microwave from Ginny's boyfriend. I also splurged and got a little one-cup coffee pot - hoping that will help deter me from such money stealers like Tully's and Starbucks. I stocked up on some groceries.  Now I really feel like a college student :D ....it's nothing impressive and I carefully planned my meals to make everything stretch the next two weeks, but I'm proud of it. Really, when you think about it, you don't need that much food to survive. I got a box of oatmeal and some bagels for breakfast, coffee (obviously, and a box of tea in case I get tired of coffee) and creamer, a huge bag of apples, banana's, some sandwhich stuff for all my lunches (I did get some really expensive avocado's for my turkey sandwhiches, yum yum vitamins!) and then a bag of burrito's, some cans of soup and some mac'n'cheese to cover dinner.

Why am I writing out my grocery list? Yeah, it's kinda dum, but I get a weird pleasure out meticulously planning my diet and then following through. Hence why I opted to get my own little mini-fridge instead of using the communal kitchen. I don't want to spend money on food and have someone else eat it if I'm not making a regular paycheck, and I like seeing how long I can go between store trips - I always enjoy food more when I'm playing spartan lol.

So far everyone in the house seems cool. I'm the only girl, but the guys all have girlfriends except for Zach, my ROTC buddy....I think he has plans on making me his girlfriend, but he's going to fail miserably. Miquel is a 36 yr old gay mexican guy who manages a restaurant, he's really friendly. Simon has lived here the longest and he's a 26 yr old amputee who is kinda the one in charge of all the day to day house related stuff, I think he's a student and he loves to cook - he's been baking a pumpkin pie from literal scratch and I'm kinda sad I'm in the basement because the smell isn't drifting down here easily like it is in the rest of the house. Mike is about my age and seems to be the punk rocker, he's got a few turtles and is really social. Then there is Zach, who lives right next to me. He's a month younger than Kyle and was infantry before deciding to go to school. He's pretty chill but likes to party a little bit. I've told him a few times that I'm not into that and I think he's going to be pretty respectful - he's fun to hang out with at least and it's nice having a ROTC guy next door so at least I know I'll always be in the loop on something.

Yesterday I climbed Mt. Si! I went with one of my best friends, Elijah, and he and I spent a few hours on it. It was a 4-mile hike up and then back down. We went up about 4,000 ft. It was mostly uphill trecks through the woods until we got close to the top. The treeline broke away and we could see forever...it was beautiful. I got my first experience actually rock climbing. The very top of the mountain is all rock and stone and it took about 45 mins of Elijah and I delicately and nimbly navigating our way up the near vertical walls until we reached the top. I remember at one moment I was hanging there, my fingers gripping the cold, wet stone, my feet dug into grooves in the rock and my body weight pushed forward  - I looked down and realized that there was a good 100ft drop below me and that was just before I hit the trees. I just remember thinking "Wow, there is no way in hell I could have done this even a year ago - how am I not scared?".  I even mentioned something to Elijah that I use to be scared of heights and he didn't believe me. Maybe having Elijah there made things easier? I'm so happy I've worked so long and hard to have a relationship with him after we broke up. Outside of my family members and George, I don't think there is any other guy I'm as close to now. I think it's knowing that our relationship is strong because we overcame our breakup and can now hang out, laugh and have deep conversations still without any worry or fear about what or how the other person feels? I don't know. All I know is that he's a very important friend/role model/big brother to me now. I know I love him, and I'm glad that I'm able to beyond just a romantic level because I know there is a depth to our friendship that I don't have with most people. But enough about that and that rabbit trail, back to the hike lol. Anyways, talking to Kyle about the hike he got a little nervous. So don't get nervous dad when you read this, yes I was hanging off of a really high rock wall with no rope system and it may have been really cold and wet  - but reassured that I was safe. Elijah had climbed that same exact wall dozens of times  and he watched me like a mother hen as I was going up so I knew I was in good hands. That being said, I think I would like to go again next weekend and hike some more. It's a nice break from school. Elijah won't be there, he's going overseas in a few days and I won't see him till June. That's gonna suck - both of my best guy friends are gone now  - but that's part of making friends in the Army. They aren't going to be with you always.


Wow - this is a long message. I should probably start working on school work again. Love you guys - take care!

Leave the Leaves

I'm sitting in the Collegium with a cup of free coffee, curled up on a leather sofa in front of the fireplace basking in warmth and glow, taking a few minutes to be still and re-energize before I head off to the library to work on stuff.

Fall is absolutely beautiful here! So many yellows, oranges, reds and maroons - I love it. I'm finding it quite funny how the groundskeepers here at SPU are engaged in a daily battle to resist fall. Just leave the leaves!!! Why do you have to interrupt my quiet meditative walks across campus with the sounds of your rakes and blowers...GAH?

Actually, as much as it irritates me it also reminds me how far I've come. I know how hard it is to rake leaves all day (well sorta, wasn't really my job but I was in the same line of work, and have to do that every day - I'm sure those guys are miserable) ...so I guess it's good sometimes too.

Today we worked on rope bridges, fun stuff. Nothing like sliding across a rope between two trees at 0500. ROTC is going well, just very very very busy and intensive. Land Nav was good this past weekend, only got four hours of sleep between that and drill but I'm ok now.

Made a B on my Russian midterm yesterday!! Not bad for only being in class for a week ;) And I got an A on my homework....veddy nice, veddy nice.

So on my to-do list today:

-Chem review (midterm tomorrow...yikes)
-Presentation for Russian (I get to tell her about you guys, all in Russian!)
-Paper in PPHS about volunteering (snore)
-4 chapters of Asher Lev
-Russian oral practice (I hate calling it that, it sounds so dirty..)

Then I've got MSCI and tutoring. I should quite tutoring because it's actually becoming a bit of an annoyance in my sched, but I like it too much. I now tutor Andre and his brother Dmetry. They're "brothers" both the same age and adopted at the same time, but from different parts of Russia. They're funny. They had me dying last week.

 Last week during tutoring I helped them both with timelines they had to create for "Eastern Hemisphere" It was fun, Andre was in a good mood because he loves art. This is his strong man, one of the things he picked out for his timeline about Japan, I thought it was cute.

 This is Dmetry's time line. He had me rolling on the ground as he explained this to me..."So these are the Aryans invading India...see? I drew an acorn on his head. The liked acorns, it was part of their religion..so I made him wear it" ...HAHAHA! Awesome.

And here are the boys :) That's Dmetry on the left and Andre on the right. Andre is kinda striking looking, he's from an island between Russia and Japan, so he's looks kinda mixed. They're both 11. Dmetry is very sharp on his feet and is prone to be mischievous, he goes to school with Jordyn and I think he likes her but he won't admit it. He's scared of me since I'm in the Army lol. Andre is smart, but not in an academic way - he struggles with school. But he's really good at drawing and loves to create stuff, and it also very curious and likes to know why something is the way it is. He's pretty funny too - he likes to make voices for the characters when he reads. His Mom and I joke he should become an actor.

Um, Yay?

It looks like I'm in Ranger Challenge. All four of us girls.

Um yay? Training will bounce from 4 days a week to 6. We're being taken away from the main cadets and trained singularly. This morning was intense stairs (all I have to say is that I really miss Lubbock right now. It was flat. Fuck stairs.), tomorrow rope bridges, wednesday ruck-march (which sounds like it will be ruck run), then ropes again, cross fit friday, ruck march/range saturday.

Good training.

I'm so stupid. Ha.

Punch It Broomzelda and Hotdog Sandwhiches

This morning I hung up "Punch it Broomzelda" on the wall in the living room. I don't know if you guys remember her? She's the little wall hang mom made a few years ago with the old fat witch on a broomstick with a black cat trying desperately to hang on. It's one of the few things I brought with me from the old house. I had actually almost forgotten that it was packed away until Ginny and I went on a walk this morning and talked about the halloween decorations that people were putting up in the yard.

October is always the hardest month for me with Mom. It's not that it's her birthday, it's the fact that it's fall and halloween and that was a time of the year where she and I always celebrated together as we went Halloween shopping, got into Samhain. This holiday also bears strong resemblances and memories of the pagan side of our life together, something that was just ours.

I've really missed her lately. More so than usual. Maybe it's the autumn leaves, the halloween decorations, the holiday season that's arriving, or how my life seems so distant now from the one I shared with her. But for some reason she keeps creeping into my mind and into my heart.

Even this afternoon, as I sliced the hotdogs and put them on the grill, I think about the sandwhiches she use to make us. I think about her coming into the living room with a plate and a mason jar full of tea, chewing out one of the cats (usually Stormi) who tried to get on her lap while she was still trying to get comfortable on the couch and moving him patiently off to the side until she was done eating....

I miss our house full of cat smell (although I can't say I miss most of the cats). I miss all the weird witches decorating the house. I miss the big crochet basket and her "nest" at one corner of the couch. I miss the cottonwood shedding leaves in our yard. I miss the sweet tea. I miss the smell of spaghetti simmering all day. I miss the smell of pinion. I miss the cigarette breaks on the front porch. I miss how the house could never really, truly be clean (as hard as Dad tried). I miss hearing Mom talk on the phone from my room. I miss her watching Jeopardy and The Wheel of Fortune. I miss her calling me "Rachel-LA" to get me to come out of my room, I miss sitting on the front porch planning our gardens together (that never happened) and listening to her try to decipher her dreams...

I miss her.

Numb Fingers

This post will take a bit longer to type than my others. My fingers are numb.

I went to bed last night at 8 and got up this morning at 8. Holla! A full twelve hours of sleep.

Yesterday evening I had my art class and then Chem lab. *sigh* My chem lab partner is nice, but she doesn't do anything. Frustrating. After leaving the lab I went to the Collegium, the exclusive little lodge for commuter students and worked on my Russian homework while eating Mac'n'Cheese (I had one of those little microwavable bowels). While studying, Kallie, who works at the desk in the Collegium and is a senior majoring in Physical Therapy, came over and we struck up a conversation. I've talked to her a few times, she's really nice and we have good chemistry together. We ended up talking about my ROTC stuff, her Senior Capstone Paper (the first I've ever heard of it, apparently to graduate from SPU you have to write a 50 page thesis paper on a subject of your choice dealing with your degree) and just life in general. She convinced me that I needed to take the night off and just chill, especially after I told her about all the time I spent in the library. So that's what I did.

Last night I came home, changed into my pajama's, made a bowel of Ramens and watched a few episodes of The Fullmetal Alchemist. I love that show. I like how they combine science and military stuff in that anime and how it clearly advocates reason over religion and action over indifference. Hrm, maybe I picked it out for those reasons? My mind has been gumbo lately with all the scientific/reason stuff pouring in one ear and the religion/faith stuff going in the other. I know that it will take time to sort it all out, but still...

I didn't make it too long. I was in bed pretty early.

I got up this morning and went for a walk along the beach. Christiana called and I talked and laughed with her for about an hour. I miss her, she's a great friend. And now I'm here. The feeling is slowly returning into my fingers (it's cold outside, very cold).

Yesterday I had a PT test. I did really well on it. Not as good as last month, but far from failing. It was funny though, all the first year ROTC guys (the freshmans) failed and all the fourth years (the seniors) passed with 300's .....it's like a before and after photo shot.

But do you want to talk about SORE!? Holy cow. My abdomen, my back and my shoulders have never been so sore in all my life. I've been stretching them and all that good stuff, but it makes no difference. I impressed Ginny the other day when I showed her my stomach, it's tightening up quickly and I've got a little four-pack. Kinda scary. I don't really recognize it much.

Alrighty guys, well I'm off to gather my things and go to the library. I have SO MUCH WORK TO DO  *sigh*

Uniforms Attract People with Asbergers.

The title is reference to an event that happened to me today when Rachel and I decided to make use of her Coffee gift card. But I'm not going into it. The title says it all haha.

So I'm sitting here again in the library. My "home away from home". I kid with my friends that my goal is to be on a first name basis with all the staff by the end of the year. 

Not really. Ok, maybe.

I just finished my paper that compared and contrasted the Cathedral of St. Basil in Moscow with the St. Ignatius Chapel here at Seattle University. Gah, that paper was NOT fun to write. But it's done. 

I had another long day today. Got up at four, met my new carpool buddies at SPU at 5:15, jumped from there over to do an LLAB and we worked on Troop Leading Procedures. Went to my Pre-Professional Health Seminar at 8:30.....and it was BOOOOORRRRRRIIIIINNNNNGGGGG. Just a few Physician Assistants talking about how to go to PA school. I was not in the mood to listen to it for some reason. 

Left there and went to the library where I met up with Rachel. She and I have been working on papers since then (it's now 7, so that's what? almost 10 hours?). Granted, I had a two hour break when I went to Military Science class over at UW. That was fun, my NCO is a SF guy and the coolest, funniest SF guy I've ever met/seen. He's just cool. 

Got back over to SPU, met back up with Rachel and then was joined by another girl in my class named Kelly who is from California. I call her Amazon, she's about 6', nordic and very "classy" but down to earth. We sit next to each other in the art class and have a similar sense of humor. So we all got together and had a "writing" party. 

We also got hushed by the librarians because we were getting too goofy. Tehehe! 

Tomorrow I gots a APFT at 6am. Sweet. My muscles are KILLING ME tonight thanks to yesterday so this will be rocking. 

What else? I can't really say anything exciting has happened here in academia.  Just working through school and trying to remember to eat, which I discovered yesterday was the reason why I was so "fuzzy headed" and weak  yesterday evening. I was at school until about 10 that night, but I got a break when I left the library around 3 and went to go take a nap in the collegium. The nap never happened because I couldn't get my brain to shut down, so instead I got up and started working on Russian. Then one of my new friends, Jessica (who I first thought was super shallow and snotty, but turns out isn't) came over with food and I was like - OH YEAH! I have food too! So I made my Pad Thai and poured a cup of coffee (the Collegium has a coffee pot. Thank. God.). You'd be proud Dad, I hadn't had coffee in three days by that point. I can't explain it but the minute I sipped my coffee and took a bit out of my sandwhich I felt so renewed. I also spent a good hour just unwinding and talking with Jessica, until we both had to leave for Chemistry (we're in the same class)....it was nice :) 

*rereads post* 

Yup. My life is bland haha. 

Holy Shit Batman.

"If you're trying out for Ranger Challenge, fall out at the command and form a separate platoon on the left. Fall out."

Being one of four girls, I thought my odds were pretty good. There are only 10 people that are chosen for the Ranger team, one of them has to be a female. I can do this, I thought to myself, psh - no problem.

So we started off with a nice jog.  Silly me, I always thought jogging was a nice, easy pace. I need to re-do my definition, since I've been led to believe that jogging meant slow when in all reality jogging is just another name for sprinting. What is sprinting then? I don't really want to know...

Oh. And stairs. Lots of stairs. So many stairs that my focus shifted from trying to breath to trying not to fall. It was hard.

"Alright, so much for the warm up. Now it's time for Cross Fit. This shit is hard. Anyone can make a 300 on the PT test, but that doesn't mean shit. If you can't carry 190lbs over difficult terrain, then you're not in shape. In Afghanistan, no one is going to spare your life because you're a "PT Ace" ....endurance, strength and agility is what will be the difference between your life and death."

After hauling all the equipment out, we were ready to show the SGT what we had. Oh, did I mention that he's a Ranger and rumor has it he's going Delta? He's also a really good friend of Elijah's and Elijah keeps mentioning that I should "drop" his name, but I just don't think that's a good decision. More like putting a target on my back.

We took off, ran 1/4 miles down hill and then back up. Damn, it wasn't that steep going down. Next, doing squats and lifting 15lb dumbbells over head. 15 reps. A little tricky, I kept doing them wrong. Got corrected twice, not good.

After that came my dreaded, most hated....pull-ups. Fuuuuuuuuu.....15 reps. Could only do two then needed assistance and man do those make me sick to my stomach. Bleyh.

Jump over to the bars and do some knee-ups, another lucky 15, then jump up and down onto these 2ft tall boxes. That looked so easy. Too bad it wasn't. Then we had to do another series of squats throwing a 20lb ball up against a wall and catching it again. Another 15.

By this point, I'm bent over gasping for air. I can feel my throat tightening up slightly - something that's been happening more and more frequently. I think it's the air up here, I've never had that problem before.

"Alright team 2 - do another two reps. Go! Go! Go!"

F.
M.
L.

.....
........40 minutes later I collapse on the ground to "stretch". We're done. My arms are jelly. My stomach hurts. My throat is on fire. My legs are vibrating. Snot is running continuously out of my nose. And this is just day one, this is just the try-outs for Ranger Team.

How do I feel I did? Eh. It's up in the air. Running was good for me, I did well and with the exception of the last hill (when the other girl got her second wind...little fucker) I was the fastest girl. But my form may not get me in, apparently the SGT has already eliminated some people based just on their form. Hrm, should have worked harder at that. And there were a few minutes where I had to take 30 seconds to rest and breathe.

I figure, if I get on the team - that's awesome. Those are points going towards my LLAB and it will be great training should I survive it. If I don't - that's ok too because I have more than enough to keep me feeling busy. Plus I'm here for another 4 years - it's not like this is the only chance I got.

All I have to say though is SHIT. I hurt. I'm sore. I need to go murder half a cow for it's protein and I'm already down two bottles of water and a gatorade this morning.

And now I get to spend the entire freaking day in the library.

-5 page paper contrasting The St. Ignatius Chapel and the Cathedral of St. Basil due friday.
-1 page paper answering questions about My Name is Asher Lev presented by the teacher due tonight.
-3 page chemistry work sheet, fortunately no due date but very wise to complete.
-Resume revision to be finished by 3pm.
-7 chapters of Russian to be completed by monday. Tested on material wednesday.
-Begin work on health seminar paper, due next week.
-Read two chapters for military science tomorrow. Didn't do that last time and it was actually over shit I didn't know. D'oh.
-Complete two separate forms to by signed by counselors and advisors today.
-Continue studying chapter 2 in Chem book.
-Memorize new terms for Art quiz on friday
(I'm writing these down as I think of them)
....

I think that is it.

I have two class cancelled today since it's the "Day of Common Learning" which is an event where there are numerous workshops held around campus all day and you can attend which ever ones you want. I'm going to one about the impact of infectious disease at 2. Then at 3 I got an advising appt. And sadly Chemistry was not cancelled tonight, so I got that from 5:30-8 and then I will probably come back up to the library and take full advantage of the library until it closes.

I just can't study at home. I had to last night and I caught myself listening to my iPod, taking a shower, making dinner.....NOT doing my homework. *sigh*

Sigh

Alarm went off at 4:30.

Got to ROTC at 5:30.

Found out PT was cancelled.

I didn't get the memo.

Was back in bed by 6:00.

What a lovely way to start the day wouldn't you say?

So....

Yesterday I conned Aunt Ginny into going to the Picasso exhibit with me. It was AWESOME! It was such a trip standing in front of the real thing, staring at his brush strokes and looking at the paintings that have garnered so much attention in the past century.

I couldn't take any pictures inside at the exhibit, so this will have to do. That's one of his paintings up top called, if I remember correctly, "Two Women Running At The Beach". It's one of his earlier pieces and stems for the period I found most enjoyable. 

The show was set up in chronological order, so we saw his earliest works first and then moved on to his most recent. As the paintings progressed it became clear that fame was getting to his head, he began dehumanizing women and his painting got more and more violent. 

All in all though it was an experience. I paid for the tickets in and Ginny covered parking, and the before and after snack. We stopped by "Seattle's Best" coffee shop and had the typical starving artist meal: 

And finished up the day with a hand-dipped caramel apple that was delicious and beautifully captured the mood in addition to the cool, crisp weather and the falling leavings that are starting to accumulate around here.

Perspective.

There is nothing like checking out the photo's of all your ex's on facebook to really put your life into perspective and make you happy that you made the choices you did.

Chris Cochran is putting on weight and is uuuuugly. To think I thought I would marry that *shudder*. Kutach is a junkie. Can't really say anything bad about Millican except he's just a kid and he doesn't even have a facebook anymore. And then Elijah, who although incredibly impressive compared to the rest of the list, is a good friend but more of the "lone alpha male" type that will never settle down....so, good riddance.

Mmmmm, I'm basking in the glow of being single and 100% in control of me and my choices. Yay. Without a man to drag me down I can freely go Mach 5.

I can't say hello, but I can say goodbye

I can't say hello in Russian, but I can certainly say goodbye, so I will begin this post with a goodbye instead of a hello.

Dosvedanya,

How are you guys doing? I'm doing great. Week 2 is down and marked off the calendar. I completed my first real chemistry lab at four and just got back from putting down $200 on textbooks because I just found out that I will be starting Russian 101 on monday :)

Maybe I should back up a bit? So here at SPU they really push you getting to know your academic and faculty advisors. I have two, Dr. Fitch is a wonderful woman who takes every pre-med student (with a high GPA, I should add) under her wing and nurtures them until they are big enough to leave the nest at SPU and she is critical in helping all of us fledglings figure out how to get from here to there. So taking her advice (she teaches one of my seminars) I set up an appointment with her.

My other advisor is my career counselor, a Dr. Wall-Scheffler who hails from Cambridge, she's also really freaking cool and I get to sit down with her next week.

Anyways, talking to Dr. Fitch she was really impressed with me and greatly respected how full of a schedule I was going to have the next three years with ROTC and school. However, she did not approve of it. Here at SPU, they encourage students to wait to take their MCAT (the medical school version of the SAT that can only be taken once) until they have finished ALL science courses, and that usually doesn't happen until the senior year. So after you graduate you take your MCAT and then do a year of internships or traveling, whatever while you work with Dr. Fitch on applications and interviews for Med school. This method is why they have a 94% acceptance rate to med school.

Unfortunately being ROTC immediately marks me off this plan. As a sophomore, I have to graduate and commission in three years. Gah. Which means I would need to apply for med school starting next year (also have to take my MCAT - shudder). While it -is- possible to do that and still get accepted, Dr. Fitch and I both understood the gravity of how difficult that would be to pull off. I mean, really, take my MCAT BEFORE I've taken over half of my science courses? Yeah.....no.

Lucky me, I'm not her first ROTC cadet. She's also gotten a few into USUHS, which is like my dream medical school. So, her advice: Take on a minor or become a double major, then ROTC will allow you to stay a fourth year because you have to complete your degree to graduate. Wonderful!

Talking to Capt. Proctor: No problem, you'll just become a freshman, won't be contract-able till next year and you'll just have to re-do some paperwork, go in front of the COL and explain yourself....yadda yadda.

Awesome.

So, for some reason when Dr. Fitch said to take a minor, Russian Studies was the first thing to come to mind. Why? Maybe because I've always had some interest in the country, a lot of my favorite classical literature books stems from that part of the world, and I think it's a beautiful language. Plus, and this is a big plus, Russian is a highly favored language skill in the military. Annnnddddd........they have a very extensive bio-warfare research institute, in fact they're the only other country that is legally allowed to have smallpox outside of the US. So good on both sides.

The only hitch was that Russian is only taught every other year, at least the language half is. The year in between it sounds like is devoted to cultural studies. This year is the year they do Russian and we're already two weeks in....uh oh.

So this morning I typed up an email and sent it off to a Prof. Netmechova and explained my background. I just got an email back from her, she is very excited to have me come into her class. Turns out she worked as a military translator, was an officer and in her words "is excited to get such a dedicated student" to come study under her. So, I went and got the books and now we're going to have to beg and plead to officially let SPU add it, since that period is over. If they don't, she says that she will grant me permission to officially enroll in Russian 102 over winter break.

I'm excited. Like, SO EXCITED.

Now...

It's 5:15. I could easily go home. I don't have anything planned over the weekend except schoolwork. And by schoolwork naturally I mean Chemistry  (and now *gasp in excitement* RUSSIAN!) ...but instead I think I will continue to sit out here basking in the last few sunrays and take full advantage of the late library hours so I can sleep in in the morning guilt free. Love you guys!

Dosvedanya.

..

*bangs head*

End post.

Slammed.

Ahhhhhh. The after burn of lactic acid in my muscles. The heavy weight in my eyelids. The realization that I have a shit load of school work to do today......priceless.

This will be brief because I didn't get a whole lot done yesterday like I thought I would. I just got back to the apartment after PT, showered, ate and now I'm waiting another 10 or 15 minutes before I leave so I won't hit traffic.

Today's PT was almost better than mondays. We did stairs at Husky stadium, which is the UW stadium if you're too stupid to put that together. I've never had to do anything like this in basic, AIT, the reserves....none of it. Usually, yeah, we do stairs. But stairs has never meant literally run up and down EVERY flight of stairs in an entire football stadium. FML.

But wait there's more....

After we had completed half of the stadiums stairs we had to start running a lap in between each set and then before we could climb again we had to do 15 situps.

But wait there's more....

As though my thighs weren't gummy after a grueling 45 minutes running stairs, they lined us up. "We're done!!" I kept thinking to myself....but no. We were starting a new exercise. This one involved putting us in teams of three. While one person sprinted to the 15, 20 and 30 yd line respectively, the other two people, depending on our position in the line, had to do sit-ups and pushups. We did 6 repititions of this.

"We're done!!!" I thought to myself.

But wait there's more.....

We did the same thing, sorta. Only this time we had to sprint to the 15, 20, 30, 40, 50 and then finish with a 60 yd line sprint (to and back) while the rest of the people in line had to hold planks. Grueling....painful...just a few words to sum up how I felt.

*sigh* We were done!!! We had to be done, I just knew it....

We weren't. There was more.....

We all got into a big circle and did waterfall pushups. Starting with one guy he performed a pushup while the rest of us held the position of front leaning rest, and then the next guy did a push up and then the next guy, so on and so forth, kinda like a "wave". Next round, we all did two, then three, then four, then five....the waves got slower and slower, my arms got weaker and weaker...till I could barely keep myself off the ground.

Finally we were done.

Is it sad that I think ROTC will be harder than Basic Training? At least, physically....I've been working out on my own for months now. I've been scoring higher on my PT test than I ever have.....and this is KICKING MY ASS.

PT makes me seeeexy.

Now onto school. I have three classes today, have to schedule all sorts of advising appointments, work on my resume, finish a paper, start another paper, work on my chemistry homework, read a chapter in my chem book, hand copy a crap load of stuff to my lab manual....um, yeah, I think that's it.

Can I get a what what?

Just Like In The Movies.

Today I was standing in the door frame at Gwinn Commons, talking to my friend Rachel. She was about to go to lunch and I had walked her there. The door is handicapped door and I didn't realize that
when Rachel had opened it she pushed the button. I was just saying good "bye" when I turned around and the door closed on me and I ran SMACK FRIGGIN into it.....completely wiped me out. GAH! In front of the whole cafeteria!!! The lunch lady felt so bad she asked if I needed a hug and I said yes.....

Curiouser and curiouser

HELLLLLOOOOOOOO familia.

This is Rachel typing from yet another random library table, overlooking the wonderful city of Seattle and it is an absolutely GORGEOUS 55*, blue skies and autumn is dripping on every leaf.

Today is a good day.

I went to "Gather" this morning which is the SPU version of church, led by the Theology department and a musical worship group of students. Connor met me (hrmmmmm....what is going on with that you wonder? I don't know. Too early to tell and really not enough time to try to figure out - but maybe that's a good thing.) and we went together and talked about how horrible it is to be getting up so early. He has rowing the same time I have pt in the morning, we feel each others pain ha.

I was really impressed with the service. One of the reasons I keep going to all these church events is because up in Seattle Christianity is an entirely different beast than it was back in Texas. In Texas I saw and experienced a lot of blind faith and hypocrisy when it came to scriptures, but up here at SPU and at Mars Hill it's a very intellectual pursuit of God, and a thorough examination of all the words, history, holes and practices of the scriptures. They really do break down and examine each word and line piece by piece in a way that I can understand and be intrigued by. Each day I feel more and more like Alice, falling down the rabbit hole and ending up in a world full of curiosities, the more look closer, the more complex and tantalizing everything becomes.

I think it's this way here in Seattle because it's such an intellectual and liberal city. It's full of people who question and want to redefine the limits, so you can't just "preach" the word of God and expect people to just go "ok, whatever you say pastor" like in Texas. Up here it's "Here's what God or Jesus says..." and everyone goes "Yeah, so? What does that mean? Where does it come from? What about this? Why should I believe that?" and then, unlike Texas where someone throws a Bible at you and says you're going to hell if you don't read it, it's more like "Well, this is why, because back in those times this is what the culture was like, this is why this word is used instead of that, Jesus was trying to make us understand this point but using this fable, this stems from this hebrew word ect ect"

I don't know. It's really interesting though. I started reading "Mere Christianity" by C.S Lewis last week and I've started to find myself in the middle of all these theological conversations. Who would have thunk it? Me.....interested in Christian theology....of all things...

Because They Care

SPU is awesome for many reasons.

What is the reason today? Because I discovered that these are free all around campus: 

Score! 

So as of right now I'm sitting in the library, getting computer stuff done until I go to class at 1:30 (Arts and the Christian Community, interesting class). One of the benefits of constantly doing homework is that you can goof off like this in the library. I spend 6 hours here yesterday working on a paper and chemistry. I mean, yeah I still have stuff to do today, but at least I don't have the guilt complex of sitting here typing away at a blog. 

This is the view from where I'm sitting right now. It's a beautiful day here, see those white puffy things? Those are actual clouds which are a rare occurrence here in Seattle. Remarkable.

Yesterday was good. I went to Church. Twice. Took Rachel in the morning and then a new friend named Connor in the evening. It says a lot that I can go to Church twice in one day, fortunately Mars Hill is pretty neat. So I don't mind. There was an Ice Cream Social afterwards for SPU students, free ice cream always = Rachel being there.

Today I went to my first ever ROTC PT. It was my mistake that I went there with the expectation that it was going to be lame and easy. My ass was kicked, to the ground and then dragged around the town. It wasn't that any of the exercises that we did were new to me, it was the high level of repetitions that I'm unaccustomed too. Maybe because SFC Burke is a Ranger....I don't know...

I feel like putty.

I'm out of here. I'm going to work on my resume and  and study Chem some more. Yay. Chem. Whoo.

Do I Have To!?

Gah...I need to go run. Do I have to?

I'm always astounded at how much I hate running until I actually go do it. Granted, the first two miles I still hate, but when I hit my third or fourth, I start enjoying it.

The other day, I ran about two miles around the peninsula and then decided to take a new route home instead of just "turning around".  I took a right up this long, winding hill and knew that it would be a good challenge for me. It was a little bit more than I bargained for and things were stop/go/stop/go for a bit. When I reached the top I was in the "neighborhoods" of West Seattle. Not far from where I was was the house of the Andrei, the boy I tutor, and from recents trips there knew that it was connected to a downhill road that came out only a few blocks from the apartment.

Things were going great until I realized that I was lost. For some reason the road I went down that I thought was going to take me to the downhill was not the one that was going to take me to the downhill. Grrrrr.

a full 12-16 blocks later of running around in something of a maze, I finally stumbled across it. Turns out I was only a block off originally -_- .....but the good thing was that I was so distracted with my surroundings I had been running at a good pace the entire time and had managed to get my breathing under control and have an amazing last half of a run.

Complete running time that day: 1:15 minutes, versus the 30 min I usually do.

MuttMitts, now THAT's interesting....

Hey guys!

So I'm back at the house chowing down on a chicken fettucini dish, with a glass of the most amazing cheap white wine (ever). Something you guys may be shocked to find out, but I am really getting into cooking. I've discovered that my quiet, lonely nights here in the apartment are less quiet and lonely if I make myself dinner and the microwave doesn't cut it anymore. I think this chicken fettucini dish is like the 8th or 9th new recipe I've tried my hand at recently. True, it's from a box, but the chicken I did on my own and I embellished it with a mixture of random spices until it tasted like I wanted to.

My day was really good. For the first time in a long time I was able to explore the wonderful city of Seattle with a partner in crime. Here is my partner in crime:

 Her name is Rachel and we've already gotten quite a few comments about that. She's really neat, she's not a dumb blonde and seems to share and contribute to my weird sense of humor quite well.
Now, I don't have all the pictures uploaded yet, so a few may come later, but I do have the first half of the day on my iPhoto.

Rachel and I (that's still kinda weird to say), started our mini-adventure around 10. I took Mosby, who thought the drive was dull, to pick her up at campus. We then hopped over and checked out Jack Block Park which is a nice, reclusive, "in the know" park neighboring the docks and overlooking downtown Seattle.

We then grabbed a cup of Clam Chowder and ate it on driftwood, washed ashore on Alki Beach. 

Haha, there is a picture of me but since it didn't pass my inspection - too bad so sad. Just a picture of Rachel, er, the other one.

After dumping Mosby (who was quite devastated), we waited for what seemed like FOREVER for the Water Taxi. I have a wonderful picture of what we nibbled on while we waiting, but for some reason it's floating in particles between my phone and my email - so that will come later. Lets just say it's a comical photo of a jar of peanut butter, a cup of blackberry tea .... on top of a fish-gut slab on a dock :D ...peanut butter and cup of blackberry tea curtesy of Rachel who thought to think ahead and bring a backpack ready for a semi-picnic. Knew there was a reason why I liked her.

We finally crossed the water on the Taxi. And I have a picture of that, but the stolen internet connection at the house doesn't like me right now. We got to the dock right as the Bainbridge Island ferry was about to leave, so I made Rachel run! And ......the minute we got to the gate they shut it and we watched it set sail. D'oh! Rachel wasn't too happy that I made her run for nothing hehehe.

So we did something crazy. We took the next available ferry to.....*drumroll* Bremerton. Kyle, you might know this place as it's a Navy base. It was actually a nice trip - it was almost an hour one way and we spent the entire time on the observation deck, watching the black water roll by and the seagulls ride the currents.

We docked and immediately set out to explore Bremerton! We were excited! We were adventurous! We found pretty much nothing.

The Naval museum was closed for a two week renovation. But we did highly enjoy and amuse ourselves with their elaborate water fountain and granite statue japanese gardens. They were quite impressive. I have a few pics, but again....*sigh* they will have to wait. After we finally got tired of playing on the pieces of art (haha) we took off to explore and found Bremerton to be almost a ghost town on a Saturday afternoon. I guess everyone takes off for Seattle, and I can see why. The coolest things we found to do was a tour of an art gallery, a visit to the Pyrex museum (that is indeed correct, I can now say that I have been to a museum dedicated completely to that wonderful phenomena, Pyrex) and a puppet museum (which was actually a little cool. They had a Jesus puppet. I had fun with that.).

We started getting hungry and decided a snack was due. We almost got sucked into an artsy fartsy super expensive coffee shop for lack of a better choice, but seran wrapped sandwhiches just didn't seem so appetizing. Lucky for us, I was rude to the lady behind the counter and told her I changed my mind and we ended up wandering around some more. That's when we stumbled across a tiny, hole in the wall European Fry joint that serves only two things: beer and french fries. For a sweet $4 we got a huge heeping cone of fries and chowed down on those, dipping them into a variety of customary sauces.

That's when we heard the horn and made it back in time to catch the ferry returning to Seattle. After watching the sea lions play around the buoys and the endless stream of jellyfish pass by, we got into a conversation with two men from New York who were part of touring production of Oklahoma and a flamboyant guy from Maui  on his way to Canada and spent the next 30 minutes sharing our outrageous experiences of living in the south. It was a nice conversation amongst strangers.

This is where the adventure ends. We got back, bummed around the waterfront docks and then took the water taxi back across. I dropped Rachel off, returned home, made my dinner and sat down at the laptop.

I'm happy to see you guys have your own blogs now :) I have them both bookmarked. And way to go Kyle, how UNORIGINAL is that name!? : P Dad, you however get bonus points because that is freaking hilarious.

Well I think I need to shower. Rachel and I are going to church tomorrow and then will spend the entire day in the library making up for the homework we could have done today :P I think the day out and about was worth it. I feel rejuvenated for this next week, which is good because the first week of school has been hectic, confusing and very pressuring, it was nice to get out and laugh and be goofy. It will be needed too, monday starts my first full week what with PT officially kicking off *sigh*.

PT makes me seeeeexyyyyy.

A Family Apart.

Well hello....um, blogger. Actually I would like to say hello to my fans, i.e Kyle, Dad and Karen :)

This is my 3am brainchild that I had last night when talking to Kyle. He called me at the horrendously late/early hour of 1am and we talked for almost two hours. We never get to talk anymore, so sometimes it has to resort to early AM phone calls to catch up -_- but I didn't mind, it was nice to talk to him.

So why is this my brainchild? Well for three reasons:

1. All of us are three hours apart. Kyle is three hours behind me. Dad and Karen are three hours ahead. It gets confusing and annoying because I'm always having to remind myself that I can't just pick up the phone and call at any time, I have to account for the time difference.

2. We use to be all in the same house (except for Karen, but still kinda the same idea) and are use to always being together. Being on opposite ends of the country (literally) is difficult when you're separated from the people you love. Plane tickets aren't cheap, so instead of seeing each other on a daily basis it's now become a once or twice a year event. That's a hard change, no matter how you look at it.

3. Talking to Kyle it became clear that he has no idea what's going on in my life and vice versa. As he was trying to explain different helicopter parts to me, I made the comment that I needed to see pictures and that's when this brainchild developed in my head. Kind of like Athena emerging from Zeus' head - which we talked about yesterday in class. What if we all had blogs and were able to talk about our days and post daily pictures about what's going on, what we're doing and how our lives are changing? Now, you guys don't have to have a blog, but I think it would be good for me to have a place to talk about what's happening in my life since it's obviously getting very hectic and I don't always have the time to call and fill everyone in. And I just happen to be self-focused enough to want to talk about myself all the time :D Yay for ego. Can I get yip?

So here goes.

So now that I have THAT out of the way, what am I doing today?

Well I've just happened to have continuously ran into a girl at SPU from Arizona named......Rachel. She's a freshman, brand-spanking new to Seattle/The North and isolated on campus without a car. So I offered to take her out and show her some different parts of Seattle. I'm very excited to move out of the tourist role to the tour guide.

It's over cast right now, but we've decided that we should go to Alki and grab a cup of Clam Chowder from Dukes. Dukes is the oldest restaurant on Alki, it's been around for almost 70 years. They have amazing Clam Chowder, made from locally caught Clams and comes at the wonderfully cheap rate of $2.50 a cup, it's a crazy deal and a crazy delicious meal. So we're going to do that, and  since I still have some points on my ORCA card (it's a Seattle card that is used for transportation, i.e buses and the ferries, I got it when I first got here with the idea that I would tour Seattle on the buses...but uh, the buses are creepy, so it just sits in my wallet) so we may take a ferry over to Bainbridge Island and bum around there. It'll be fun, Rachel has never seen so much water before much less been on a boat - so I can't wait :) Maybe we'll see whales....ah...the elusive whales...

Oh yeah, about my blog name....

It was one of my favorite meals growing up and to this day still reminds me of the house in Round Top and brings to mind fond memories of all of us, particularly Kyle as he and I would sometimes fix this and then watch a movie together. So when I was thinking about what would be an appropriate name at 3am, this was the first thing that came to mind.

This is Mosby, a Boston Terrier that I'm currently puppy-sitting while his folks, my good friends Selena and Mac, are out of town. He's the only small dog I like. He's not a morning dog. He may go with us to see the beach :) 

And this is the only other picture in my phone that was interesting today. I'll start taking pictures while I'm out and about for this blog. What is this you ask? Well this would be my new "bullseye"....that makes me a cadet. I still have my specialist rank, but I can only wear it at Drill. 

Alright peeps, it's time for me to get out of my pajama's and clean myself up. Have a good day, I love you all.