A new chapter on the horizon

I am sitting here in absolute amazement. I have just written and printed my final undergraduate paper. I turn it in tomorrow and take one really easy test on Thursday and then I'm a college grad. You have no idea how sentimental I am and how freaked out I get when my world changes. And this?? Will be a big change. I will be off school for an entire semester as my graduate program doesn't start until end of May early June. Also, I work as a student assistant in an office on campus and because I am graduating that means I'm leaving my job too.

I know that I bitch and moan about school and how stressed I am but I cannot fathom not being in school. It is what I do, all I've known. I have worked, but jobs have always been secondary to getting my education. What will I do with all the TIME??? How will it feel to read a book or watch t.v. and not be thinking, in the back of my mind, that I should be working on such and such that's due next week?

And work, don't even get me started on how sad I am to be leaving my perfect little office. I'm still in denial about this one. I have worked there for 3 and a half years, so basically all of my undergrad years, and I love it. It is private so I'm not constantly forced to interact with other students, the schedule is flexible, the work load is light and simple, and the people are amazing. Oh the people I work with...I wish I could bottle them up and take them with me. I cannot imagine not walking to my office and saying hello to Peg, and practicing portuguese with Janete, and listening to Phyllis curse and laugh, and talking to Kaye about her adorable grandson and what she did over the weekend. These people have been more than people that I work for and with, they have been my cheerleaders and have supported me in all the work I've done both academically and otherwise. They have taken a true interest in my life and have made going to work pleasurable. I am so very sad to be leaving my little nest. I just want things to stay the same, I am so scared of change. I cannot imagine finding a better work environment or people who care more about me. They are throwing me a celebration on Thursday and I promised myself I wouldn't cry until Friday (my last day), I doubt I'll be able to follow through. Today when I got to work there was an envelope with pictures of an outing that I went on with Peg and her grandson, so thoughtful. Little gifts have been trickling in and even better little words of encouragement and congratulations. They have confidence in me that I will succeed, more confidence in fact, then I think I have in myself.

So here's to starting new chapters, which quite frankly simultaneously terrifies and excites me.

Feelings of inferiority anyone...anyone....Bueller?

I don't know if I've mentioned here that one of my moms all time favorite quotes is "No one can make you feel inferior witout your consent" (or something like that) by Eleanor Roosevelt. Well my mom would not be proud because I've been noticing recently that I am pretty much constantly feeling inferior.

As I study for the GRE (which I take on August 23rd, pray for me!) I think, "how does anyone pass this? I must be some kind of idiot because I've been studying for nearly a year and I still don't know half the vocabulary and the math? Just forget about it. I know some real idiots who've gotten their masters degree and they had to take this same test, maybe I'm not as smart and capable as I thought."

As I prepare to graduate from college in December, with Honors no less, I find myself saying "Yeah but I just got into the honors program on a fluke and the real honors students are so smart and organized and prepared. I save everything until the last minute and don't really deserve to be here because I never read the books or spend hours studying like everyone else claims to, the information just sticks".

As I'm walking into work I see a well-dressed, pretty girl walking past me and I automatically shrink back thinking well maybe I'm single because I don't have legs like her, or hair like so-and-so" (yes I think that, no I don't actually believe it...most of the time.)

As I am reading the truly inspiring words of other bloggers out there and listen to them talking about the great blogging community I scroll down and see 10's and 100's of comments and I think "I know my writing sucks and I admittedly don't have much time to put into this whole blogging thing but couldn't someone at least comment every tenth post or something? I want to feel involved, but then when I think about it how often do I comment, or link, or anything of that nature? The answer: RARELY, so that's another big FAIL.

I minimize my accomplishments and feel that all I've achieved is mediocrity. It comes down to the fact that I am such a perfectionist deep-down, that on the surface I choke when I have to do things because I am scared they won't be great enough. I feel that everything I do is sub-standard, even when that is not the case (or so I'm told). I feel that I am inferior for being 22 and still living at home, for not being in any kind of long-term relationship, for watching all my friends lives come together while I'm in school struggling to become an adult. Buy hey, at least I'm fighting back and making something of myself, let's hope it's not just something average.

I'm baaaack

Okay so thank you for being patient with me while I sorted my shit out. I am feeling much, much, better and even have a hint of optimism. So, with that being said lets move on.

My computer has officially totally died and therefore the vacation pictures must wait a little bit longer.

Maggie is now attending doggie daycare three mornings a week (I never thought I would be one of "those people" but heck it sure beats coming home to see that your big loving beast got bored and decided to CHEW THE MOTHER F'ING WALL (true story))

My summer class starts next month already! :(

I met my best friend S's new b.f. while I was in Virginia and he is amazing and I just know he will be her husband some day, so excited for her! Finally, one that is worthy of her!

Oh and my cousin might be moving her wedding up, like waaay up and that means I have significantly less time to lose weight than I had originally planned. GAHHH!

And thats about all the updates I have for now because as they say: It's summer time and the livin's easy

A la folie..pas du tout (He loves me, he loves me not)

Okay so this movie is basically amazing and I highly recommend it. It gets a double bonus because it actually made me excited to go to French class for once in my life! I loooove Audrey Tautou (she also plays in Amelie). Also I am so proud that I watched the entire movie in French with French subtitles and managed to understand it!!!!! woo hoo now if only I could go back to Paris (I visited once, when I graduated high school and it was pretty much a-freakin-mazing).

Also my blog-iversary is coming up, I cannot believe it's been a year of my incoherent babbling. Anyone who's reading (regularly or otherwise)feel free to ask me any questions in the comments and I'll answer them on my blogs birthday!

Class of 2004: redifining pathetic

I'm about 45 minutes away from going to my first class of the spring semester, after that vacation is officially over :( bummer. Right now I'm at work not working but instead looking up people I graduated with on Myspace. The people I graduated with make me cringe. They have no goals other than getting drunk, smoking pot, and (for the girls) finding men to knock them up. Where is the ambition? Why don't these people want anything for themselves? I mean seriously for some of them the crowning achievement of their life would be getting on disability so they don't have to work. It is sad, there are so few of us who are making anything out of ourselves. Now I'll step down off my soapbox and get to class. Also, I cringe to think about how these people will look at our 10 year reunion.

Schooooools out for Christmas

Finished my last final yesterday whooo hooo!!! Now I have one month and two days off, thank goodness. Although in retrospect this semester wasn't nearly as tough as some of my past ones. Thats all for now, I'm too busy celebrating to say anything insightful!

The UV rays probably fried her brain but it's okay because she wears lotion on her face

Just taking a break from homework to say that I tried a water aerobics class tonight and it kicked my ass! It feels all fine and easy when you're in the water but when you get out damn! It feels like gravity is gonna suck you right into the earth's core. Anyways while I was changing in the locker room I heard one of the stupidest comments ever.

Girl 1: I had bubbles around my eyes after I went tanning the other day.
Girl 2: Oh, that can be a sign of skin cancer.
Girl 1: I know that's why I always wear lotion or something on my face and I don't wash my face before I go tanning.

Okay is it just me or is that stupid as hell. Yes you put lotion on your face in the morning (most lotions only have like an SPF of 15) which is probably worn off by the time you tan and even if your face is protected (which it obviously wasn't)what about the rest of your body???????? Am I missing something here?

When I'm tired of watering my plants I let my cats eat them, does that make me a feline nutritional specialist?

Just checking in to write about something a guest lecturer in one of my classes said that I found hilarious. He was talking about the origin of the human species and blah blah blah, lots of boring talky talky, and then he said "Some mammals do the respectable thing and lay down and die when they're finished reproducing and raising their young but what do we do??? We go out to the garage and make bird-houses and shit" That was absolutely hilarious to me and loud cackling commenced. Maybe you had to be there but trust me it was funny. Also, I am composing some other posts in my mind but I think I'm coming down with a cold or something and I'm too lazy to write anything else so with that I will finish this writing business and go wallow in bed and watch tonight's intriguing, Halloween themed, episode of The Singing Bee.

edited to add: holy crap there was a woman on the aforementioned episode of The Singing Bee that is actually employed as a "canine chef" Hell, even I could do that; dogs eat their own crap for goodness sake how good of a cook do you really need to be? (no offense to all the canine chefs out there)

Are your nickles beautiful?

Ok I'm gonna say how much school sucks for just a couple seconds and then I'll stop being all "woe is me" about my life. Dude, the fourth year of college, it is hard. There is much studying and learning of obscure facts that don't have much to do with my future career at all. And here I sit at work with nothing to do and instead of catching up on some of said studying here I am writing a blog entry hahaha That's me redefining procrastination on a daily basis! That should be the slogan for my life.
Anyways everything else is good, the doggies are adorable as usual and there's not much else to report. Oh wait I do have one funny tidbit to report I was talking to the bf the other day and he wasn't wearing a shirt and I looked down and said "Wow I never noticed it before but your nipples are really small" he thought about it for a minute and said "Do you think my nickles (nipples) are beautiful?" LOL

Le Francais est tres difficile

I have a hilarious video from this weekend that will be forthcoming but right now my phone is being an idiot so I can't send it to my computer.
Anyways on to today's story. I am a psychology major as you may or may not know and because it is a bachelor of arts degree I am required to take 4 semesters of a foreign language; I chose French because I had taken it in high school. The first two semesters were a dream, I had a hilarious instructor who was actually from France and really knew how to help us grasp the language. Fast forward to this semester, my instructor is an absolute nightmare, she is rude and condescending and if she asks you a question and you answer the best you can (in french of course) but don't have anything else to say she just keeps waving her hand at you while rolling her eyes. She explains absolutely nothing in English including the grammar aspects such as tenses (there are a million of them) and definitions of vocabulary words. I am so stressed about that class that I have actually cried. So today we had to do a "causerie" where we were randomly paired with a classmate and randomly assigned one of three topics. While we were speaking the rest of the class was out in the hall. It was great being able to sit out there and worry and chat with all the other people who knew just as little as me (or so I thought). We had a lot of fun and made a lot of jokes but then I actually had to go in and participate and it was a nightmare. Sometimes I exaggerate and think that I did worse than I actually did but not today. By the time we were finished all my instructor could say (in front of my classmate) was: "you have very limited speaking skills" to which I replied "I know, it's very difficult for me to speak it because in previous semesters I wasn't required to do so to this degree but I assure you that I can understand it and write it decently" and once again she simply rolled her eyes. WHAT A BITCH. I mean seriously at least I'm trying (unlike half the people who simply skipped class), it's not my major and I will most likely never use it after I am finished with school. Don't get me wrong I enjoy studying it and I believe it is a great asset to learn many languages but when someone acts the way she does it just makes me self-conscious and makes me want to shut down and stop trying. I cannot wait until this semester is over, next semester I will most definitely take the class from a different instructor. Oh woe is me and my terrible life of academia lol

The lengthy entry filled with multiple complaints (sorry)

I have been avoiding this blog like the plague. Scared to face my feelings, but I will, eventually. For now lets listen to me whine about the beginning of school shall we??? The first day of class I accidently slept through my first one but other than that things have been going well. The classes seem pretty straightforward and easy enough but French is gonna be a big hurdle. Anyways back to the class I missed Monday morning, I had it again this morning and I was determined to get there on time, get my syllabus and catch up on anything I had missed. I was on campus (and by campus I don't mean just pulling out of my driveway like I usually do) 30 freakin minutes before class was scheduled to start. For anyone who does not know me that is a miracle, I am usually at least 10 minutes late for everything. But damn it I was gonna make a good impression. So I roll into the parking lot thinking I'll have a leasurely stroll to class HAH. My first two days of class found me gloating to my mom that "not living on campus is no problem at all, I just pull into a parking lot and someone is always leaving, it's fine, parkings no biggy" (insert slap upside my head here) Today, the day I neeeeed to be on time there is not one spot on the entire campus. I went to every lot, deck, and grass field around and there were caravans of cars following pedestrians hoping to steal their parking spot. After and HOUR of this bullshit I finally parked illegally and hoped I didn't get a ticket. I was so fed up at this point I literally felt like vomiting. I looked like such a dumbass for missing the first day and then sauntering in roughly 40 minutes late to the second class. Cripe!!!! So I'm practically tripping over myself rushing to walk alllllll the way across campus and the entire fucking walkway to the building I need to go to is closed. Our campus is constructed in such an arbitrary manner that it is extremely difficult to get to the building in a different way but alas I prevailed and cut through the student union walked across the street past the athletic fields and up two flights of stairs. Come to find out everything was blocked off because of a bomb threat. You think I could have guessed it was something semi-serious when I saw the m.f'ing NEW CHOPPER circling over my head but I was all "woe is me, couldn't they repair the walkway during the 4 freakin months of summer vacation, gosh I hate these people, they have no common sense"
It seems as though all is okay though classes in that particular building the bomb threat was made for were canceled. Also my professor seems totally cool that I missed the first class and totally interupted the second one, and he should be cause I pay about a million dollars a semester to be there (Yes, I know that's not his fault)

Career? That sounds all fancy-like. Do not want.

Today's lesson: Sometimes waiting until the last minute to do a paper really works and the bullshit flows like wine (albeit cheap wine from a box, possibly with a broken spout, but wine nonetheless.)

Oh and incidentally I will be starting my fourth year of college in a couple weeks, I cannot believe it. Because I changed my major a while ago I won't have my bachelors until December of 08 but sweet mother of humanity I have friends who are graduating,graduating. As in they will have careers not just jobs. My friends, people I associate with and suffered through high-school with will be professionals, followed shortly thereafter by me. Where does the time go?? It feels like I just started college and that I've been there forever all at the same time. I still don't feel like i graduated high-school and college graduation is fast approaching (not to worry it will be followed by several years of grad-school before I can begin my career, mother of pearl that sounds weird). The sunrise-sunset-ness of it all it just too much.

Procrastination, it's my middle name

Ok I really need to not wait until 11 o'clock the night before a test to start studying! Anyways to procrastinate studying even more my lesson for today is: When changing the toner on a copy machine you don't actually take the whole thing out and put a new one in like you would on a printer; it's more of a transferring the contents of one thing to another thing type deal, and if it's done incorrectly I hear it's one of the messiest mistakes ever (not that I would know personally). So by all means read the instructions on the box or at least pay attention to the freaking tutorial that the copy machine itself will walk you through.

Schools not out for summer

So I started my summer class Monday (Dynamics of Personality) and at first I was totally bummed. The class is two hours long everyday for the rest of summer, but then I had a revelation the class consists of only two papers and a few tests and I now only have to work two hours a day plus the subject matter and instructor are pretty interesting. So I've decided that I'm glad I sucked it up and took a summer class because it motivates me to get stuff done and I have to work less, I'm such a lazy ass.

Oh yeah and today's topic of discussion in class: defense mechanisms. It was very interesting because I am guilty of almost all of them, hahaha maybe I should work on that.

On the verge of finals week

Am fucking swamped with school shit!
Hate it.
Wish I could learn without all the deadlines and mandatory shit.
Shouldn't procrastinate.
Oh well, can't teach an old dog new tricks

Nicole, the fraudulent writer

As I sit here trying to write the last 8 pages of my 10 page paper that is due TOMORROW I have come to the realization that I absolutely adore writing...but only on my terms. Give me a topic and a deadline and writers block takes up residence in my brain. I am constantly feeling like my words are all wrong and I'm not portraying what I wish I could be portraying. Basically, what it amounts to is that I'm an only child and therefore a perfectionist and I am so scared of failure that I will wait till the last minute to do an assignment because I don't want time to re-read or re-think it. Thus far the strategy has worked and I usually get great grades on anything that involves writing because though I may be a perfectionist I am also the Queen of b.s.-ing my way through stuff. But I'm worried that one day my luck will run out and the entire academic community will realize that I am nothing but a fraud and they will take back all the good grades they ever gave me. Yeah I know just shut up and write the freakin paper, if only it were that easy.

On Obituaries

I'm noticing a definite theme here. Today, for the third time in my life, I have been asked to write my own obituary. I know I don't always look my best but does everyone think I look like I'm dying?

Maybe I'm over-reacting because this was assigned to the whole class (on all three occasions, the first dating back to my Sunday School days.) But goodness, I don't want to think about dying. Maybe someday I'll be comfortable with death, specifically my own, but right now I just have too much life left to live and too many things to accomplish and too much to prove to myself. So I may be about to write my own imaginary obituary but I am far from dying.