Life Without School Is Kinda Boring.

I know that doesn't seem like a logical sentence and you must think I'm losing my mind, but it's true. I've been doing school the last, like, fifteen years of my life and NOW I'M DONE. Which was cool for all of about two hours and then it hit me that, um, I had nothing to do.

Like seriously, I have no life. I kinda had to put whatever inkling of a life I once previously had on the back burner about a year and a half ago when I decided to take the fast-paced approach to college, and didn't realize that that would have severe consequences once I no longer had to do school.

I. AM. SO. BORED.

Yeah, I'm working still. About 30 hours a week. But y'all? There's 168 hours in a week. And yes, I did google that number (twice, because I closed the tab and then promptly forgot what it said), because I'm now [almost] a college graduate and therefore I don't need math anymore. But that's not the point. The point is that there's 138 hours a week where I have nothing to do.

Okay, that's not true. Factor in like, 56 hours of sleep and like two to three hours for church on Sundays...oh! and two hours for my summer group on Tuesday nights...and that leaves me with....hold on...like 70ish (that's not the exact number but AGAIN I don't need math anymore) hours a week where I have nothing to do.

So...what have I been doing with all that free time you ask?

• Reading this AMAZING baking blog I found via Pinterest, and baking ALL of her recipes (Okay, only three. But I'm working on it.)
• Reading this makeup blog (also found via Pinterest) and being reminded how much I LOVE reading up on makeup/hair care/skin care tips, and constantly giving myself makeovers.
• Pinteresting. Meaning, doing every DIY I've ever pinned ever.
• Watching Gossip Girl on Netflix. Because I can't get away from the trashy teen dramas.
• Cleaning/reorganizing my room/bathroom because for some reason THEY JUST DON'T STAY CLEAN.
• Shopping at Goodwill, because it's close and I love new clothes and great deals.
• Spending 45 minutes at Wal-Mart trying to find where the heck they keep the glycerin and the castor oil (for a Pinterest hair mask I was making).

So basically, since finishing college, I have become a well-dressed, thrifty, organized, teen-soap-opera addicted Pinteresting machine monster with cookies. And blondies. Ooooh, can't forget the blondies. They're the best.

Like, no really. When I die, I really hope it's while I'm eating a blondie*. Best way to go, right there.

*I JUST realized that if you don't know what a blondie is, it might sound like I'm eating a female of the blonde hair variety. A blondie is basically a brownie without the cocoa. It looks more blonde than brown so it's called a blondie.

It's crazy how when you have school work to do, there are a million other things you'd rather be doing, but when you don't have school...there's NOTHING to do. That saying that "you don't know what you've got until it's gone" really rings true for me right now. (In a kind of pathetic way.)

But anyway, does anyone else have any other ideas of ways I can keep myself busy? Oh, and PLEASE don't say "working out." Because seriously, I'm not THAT bored.

P.S. Oh yeah, I finished college last week. I just realized y'all didn't know that before I wrote this post. Oops.

Happiness Abounds.

"Happiness abounds." That sounds so poetic. But it's true. The happiness has been abounding!

Here's why:

1. I turned in the final copy of my 42 page capstone last Saturday. That's happy.
2. On Monday, I found out that I made a -- wait for it -- 95 on my 42 page capstone. That's happy.
3. That means I made an A in the one and only college class I'm taking that actually counts toward my GPA. That's double happy.
4. Also on Saturday, I went to a friend's wedding. Weddings are happy. 
5. Today, I found out that my supervisor at work is engaged. Engagements are happy.
6. Today is also the last day of classes at UTA. That's happy.
7. Yesterday marked the beginning of May, aka the last month of me being a college student. That, my friends, is happy.

So as you can see, the happiness is in fact abound. It is so abound, and I hope it stays there. Because happiness is way happier than unhappiness. Does the word "happy" sound weird to you yet? It does to me.

Anyway, you all know that I want to be an elementary school teacher, right? If not, you do now. Over this past school semester I have slowly gotten closer to making that a reality and I am SO excited. I've been helping my mom out with her drama class, and got a couple subbing jobs for a second grade class (which was a lot of fun, but you know how kids are with subs -- I am really hoping they'll listen to me more when I'm actually their teacher, haha). And then after I graduate college, I'm going to take the summer off, and then start working on getting teacher's certification. I'll probably also look into doing some assistant teaching with an elementary school teacher.

I feel like I'm not going to know what to do with my life once I graduate. I mean...obviously I'm gonna work. But I'm not going to have homework. What am I going to do in the evenings?! Supposedly your life actually gets busier once you're out of school, but I don't understand that concept yet. I'm freaking out about not having enough to do. I guess I'll find out soon enough.

I don't really have any big events to update y'all on other than that. In a few weeks I'm going to be participating in a color run. Remember the mud run? It's like that, but with colored cornstarch...we're supposed to look like rainbows after it's done. Awesome. I'll be sure to post pictures of that, and anything else that may come my way.

I also have a few random posts in my drafts that I know I keep talking about and not posting. I'm going to work on finishing those, too, haha.

Until then...

Where Have I Been?

...All your liiiiyyyyiiiifffeee?!?!?!

(That's a song, guys. Kind of.)

So I just *happened* to be looking through my blog feed on blogger and then my eyes jumped up and noticed that I haven't posted in over a month.

Oops.

I actually think that's wrong. I don't feel like it's been that long. Really, I don't. I blame Netflix. I got a Netflix account, and because I'm not a big fan of movies but I L-O-V-E getting hooked on a good TV show, I've been watching approximately 4 seasons of various shows per week.

Don't worry, I actually only did that for two weeks in a row. But watching that much TV seriously makes the days go by, like, super fast.

Actually, the main* reason I've been gone is because I'm working on finalizing my Capstone project which is due two weeks from tomorrow! What a relief it will be when it's over; this project is SO HUGE.

*Main meaning I work on it for the two whole days before each assignment is due. And assignments are due every two weeks. So however much of a main reason that can be. That's my reason. Netflix is the other main reason.

So basically what I'm trying to say here is...I'll be back in two weeks, haha. BECAUSE the FINAL project is due in TWO WEEKS...and I can't just wait until the day before to start working on that one. No more procrastinating for this girl.*

*HA. Heard that before.

I'm actually supposed to be working on that right now...so I'm gonna go get back to that. Basically the purpose of this post is so that it doesn't say my last post was March 7th, because that really bothered me. So, the cobwebs have been dusted off of this blog, and I will be back to dust them off again in two weeks!

A Favor.

Hi there!

Would you mind doing me a favor?

I am working on my capstone project about the effect of birth order on personality, and I have created a survey to help support my research.

It's a very short survey -- it should only take a couple minutes.

It's completely anonymous, so I won't judge you on your answers.

Would you mind taking it? I would SO appreciate it.

Here's the link:

http://kwiksurveys.com/s.asp?sid=8alagjeeqaqwymw98703

Just click on that, answer the questions, and then you're done! I'll see the answers and be forever grateful to you, even though I won't know who you are.

Thank you SO much! You ROCK.

I Almost Died Today.

And now I know what it's like to see your entire life flash before your eyes.

And when you get through reading this, you're going to hate me for scaring you into thinking I almost died when in fact I was nowhere near death. But I wanted to die.

Here's how it went down:

I am taking a music class this semester called History of Jazz. Today we were scheduled to have a guest speaker who's a famous jazz drummer from New Orleans, named Adonis Rose (he toured with Harry Connick, Jr.!). It is also important to note that I almost skipped this class today, because of something going on in another class that overlapped with Jazz. However, when I heard we were having a guest speaker I was intrigued, and decided to work around the other thing.

Normally when people hear a guest speaker is coming to class they think they're going to like, come to class and talk and stuff, right? I thought he was going to speak about being in a jazz band and his background, and maybe play some drums for us.

Instead, he came into class, introduced himself and gave us a little bit of his background, and then he quizzed us.

Meaning, he picked on random people in the class to answer questions about jazz history. He called on me once. I didn't know the answer, but it wasn't a big deal. Most people didn't know the answers.

He then wanted to know who in the room were musicians by show of hands. So we raised our hands and then he asked specifically for singers, of which I am. So I kind of shyly raised my hand, but he was all like "Raise 'em real high!" so I raised my hand higher along with a couple other people in the class.

And then he was like, "Great, we'll have to get y'all up here to sing for us," and went on to ask if there were any rappers. We all chuckled when he said that because it was a funny joke.

It wasn't a joke.

And this is where my life starts flashing before my eyes.

After finding out if there were any rappers or poets in the room, he called on one of the singers to come up and sing a song. Per a fellow classmate's request, he sang You Are My Sunshine.

After that, he called on the only poor guy in the room who said he was a poet and made him recite a poem. I felt bad for the poor chum who recited this sappy love poem to the entire class. I'm sure it wasn't written for public recitation.

Then he goes back to the singers and I'm sitting in my chair shaking panicking convulsing and he calls on a girl in the front row. She sang At Last by Etta James, which is very appropriate for a jazz class. She sounded really good, but she hit a few bad notes, probably because nerves and big songs don't go well together.

Then he couldn't remember who else was a singer and I'm all like yes I'm off the hook! Praise God. and then he looks at me and points and says "You in the striped shirt" (and I regretted immediately wearing a striped shirt, though I'm not sure that made much of a difference).

And then I died.

But my vocal chords were still very much alive, which meant I had to get up and do this thing. He asked me what my name was and I squeaked out "Kayla". I could almost hear the Death March as I walked to the front of the class, which so conveniently has a stage.

I avoided all eye contact with the audience until I started singing. Adonis asked me what I was going to sing, and I tried to make a joke because I use humor as a defense mechanism. I said, "I'm going to sing a country song. I would do jazz but I don't know many of those."

I know what you're thinking...that's not funny. That's a perfectly normal statement to make...yeah. I know. It sounded funnier in my head.

So then I sang my song. The Night Before (Life Goes On) by Carrie Underwood. I sound good on that song and it was the first one I thought of so I went for it. And I sang through the first verse and chorus of that song, and I walked back to my seat to a reprise of the Death March, and then I died again.

And then another girl came up and just showed up all of us with her stupid confidence. She sounded like Norah Jones and she sang a song she wrote all by herself because apparently she's a budding singer/songwriter.

And now it's been about an hour since this horrific experience and I'm sitting in the cafe, still recovering. Still shaking a bit.

But on the bright side, my Facebook status about this experience has 15 likes and counting.

Awkward Moment #324.

I made up that number. It's really probably a lot higher than 324.

So classes started back up today. Well, they started yesterday, but I'm only taking Tuesday/Thursday classes so for me, they started today. Anyway.

I'm taking four classes, from 9:30-3:30. No breaks in between for lunch (that is called poor planning, people), but since today was mainly just going over the syllabus, I got out of almost all my classes 45 minutes early.

After my 11:00 class which I got out of about 11:40, I was starving, so I decided to head over to the University Center for lunch. I got Chickfila. It was yummy.

Anyway.

It's always really awkward trying to find seating in there. Because all the tables are usually occupied by multiple people...it's really hard to find one seat that's appropriately spaced from the other groups at the same table. But eventually I found one and sat down to enjoy my lunch.

Anyway.

I was facing another table, and a guy sat down on the side facing me with a Subway sandwich. While he was eating, I happened to notice a piece of lettuce stuck to his lip. So naturally, I did what anyone would do in this situation: I stared at it.

I wanted to see if it would fall off or if it was going to stay stuck there. So I'm staring at this guy for like, I don't know, a minute, when suddenly, he looks up. Right at me.

I quickly avert my gaze.

I turn my head slightly to look back down at my food, and out of my peripheral vision I see this guy smiling and waving at me.

Do I wave back? Do I acknowledge him? What do I do?

Well, I'll tell you what I did.

I mustered up some courage and eked out a very, VERY timid smile that you would only notice if you were looking for it really, REALLY hard.

And then he starts to get up. And I'm FREAKING out.

This is essentially what went through my head: Oh my gosh he's getting up. Oh my gosh. Is he coming over here? Don't look. Whatever you do don't look. Oh my gosh. Does he think you were trying to communicate interest? How do I explain to him that I was staring at him because he had a piece of lettuce stuck to his lip? This is going to be soooo awkward.

Anyway.

He gets up. And as he's doing so, he's saying something, but I can't tell what. And he starts walking...and he's getting closer and closer...

And he completely ignores me as he walks by and joins his friends at a different table.

Apparently, when I was staring at the lettuce on his lip, some friends of his at another table spotted him and yelled his name, which is why he looked up. And then the whole time he was smiling and waving at them, not me. Which hopefully means he didn't notice me smiling.

So I guess it wasn't really an awkward moment...but it almost was.

I felt awkward, at least.

REALLY awkward.

Moral of the story: don't stare at lettuce on strangers' lips.

30 Days of Thankfulness.

Lately my Facebook and Instagram feeds have been filled with posts detailing things that various people are thankful for. One thing that you're thankful for, once a day, for the entire month of November. Not sure where it started, but I kind of think it might be the female alternative to Movember/No Shave November.

November: The month of thankfulness and beards.*

*Important note: not to be confused with thankfulness FOR beards. No woman I know enjoys the barbaric appearance of the male gender during the month of November. Or any month. Keep that in mind, guys.

Anyway, I wanted to be thankful, too. But instead of posting one thing every day and adding yet another thing to read on your Facebook feed, I'm going to post all 30 at one time. Right here, where you can choose to read it now or later or not at all. And so, without further ado, 30 things I am thankful for.

1. The Lord Jesus Christ and everything that comes with believing in Him. I am a sinner. I deserve nothing more than death. Yet my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ decided that I (and everyone else on Earth) was worth a second chance. He came down here and died so I could live. He saved my life, and He saved yours too. As if that isn't great enough, all He asked in return is that I live my life for Him. And though sometimes I fail, he continues to be merciful and forgiving. I am so not worthy, yet He loves me anyway. And for that, I am eternally thankful.

2. My family. No matter how loud, crazy, weird, annoying, imperfect, and embarrassing they might be sometimes, I wouldn't trade them for anything.

3. My friends. I'm an only child. Because of this, my friends have always meant so much to me. My friends have acted as siblings to me my whole life, and I'm thankful that they love me and don't mind being in public with me even though they know how weird and crazy I am.

4. My church. My church is awesome, y'all. The sermons are always applicable and they're like, super good stuff. Everyone is welcoming and they make serving fun. I have created so many healthy relationships and am consistently furthering my walk with God through my church. I'm also grateful that I have a church to go to, because so many people in other countries don't. 'Merica.

5. America. Even though the president that I believe would have been best for this country lost the election, I am still grateful, because it could be a lot worse. The fact that there's really no country that would be better to go to says a lot. I'm proud to be an American.

That concludes the serious/main/long items. The next 25 will be much shorter and random.

6. This weather. High is 82 today. Right now it's 68. I'm currently (I probably won't be when I actually post this) sitting outside on my college campus because I had a bunch of time to kill after taking a test. The grass is green, the trees are changing color, the sky is clear, and the breeze is just right. I could stay here all day, but I have to go to work in about 45 minutes...

 Imagine sitting in the shade of a tree, in 70 degree weather, and this bliss surrounding you.

7. Work. My job. I have an awesome job at a fantastic company with great people. I love it. And though it's not what I ultimately want to end up doing with my life, having a job -- especially one that you love -- is such a great privilege these days and I'm going to hold on to it as long as I can.

8. The guy who is currently studying in the next tree over from me, because he provided me great entertainment for me as I watched him greatly struggle to climb the tree. I actually think he got stuck. Poor guy, but it did brighten my day.

9. The bee that has been buzzing around me for the past 20 minutes. He hasn't stung me yet. Thanks, little guy.

10. Ice cream. And sweets in general. My sweet tooth would seriously suffer if these things had never been invented.

11. My bed. If you have never laid on my bed...you're missing out. Everyone who has agrees that it is the most comfortable thing since yoga pants.

12. Yoga pants. Who invented these?! I must meet this genius.

13. The inventors of CLEP, DSSTs, and online college courses who are helping me obtain my college degree in just one year.

14. Thomas Edison State College, who accepts unlimited transfers and allows you to take online courses. Without TESC, I wouldn't be able to graduate this summer and/or have to move to New Jersey for a semester.

15. Sunsets and sunrises. Not only are they fun to watch, they're a great reminder of the Supreme Artist. God is so creative.

16. Summer. A break from school is always much needed after a long semester. And I do love warm weather.

17. Fall. Usually by the end of summer I'm ready for slightly cooler weather and fall clothes. And of course, Starbucks' salted caramel hot chocolate.

18. Music. Without music...I think I might die. I'm always listening to it. ALWAYS. I'm listening to it right now. I don't really know why I like music so much...I just do. It's a huge part of my life. And I'm thankful for it.

19. Children. Little kids have a tendency to make my day, no matter how bad it's been. I think they're cute and hilarious and I just love them.

20. My car. I would have problems getting places without it because my school is 30 minutes away from my house, and I go straight from work to school...and both my parents work, and there's really no one else who could take me. Also, I got a really nice car for a very affordable price. Also something to be thankful for.

21. Food. Mainly because I'm hungry right now.

22. Graphing calculators. Because as confusing as they are to me...I would not have passed calculus without one. (Though I might have done better if I knew what all the buttons did...)

23. Animals. I just love animals. Big, small, cute, ugly, indoor, outdoor, red fish, blue fish...you get the point. I would be lost without my pets. They mean the world to me.

24. Flexible professors, church leaders, and bosses who are willing to work with my busy schedule.

25. Laughter. I love laughing. I think it's the greatest thing since milkshakes. (Though I think laughing came first, so never mind). Imagine how much more boring the world would be without laughter.

26. Writing. Writing is my outlet. I turn to writing when I'm happy, sad, angry, embarrassed, nervous, scared, or excited. Imagine all that emotion bottled up inside me if I couldn't write...I would explode.

27. A house. This is in no particular order by the way. Because I'm definitely more grateful for a house than graphing calculators. But yeah. Really thankful I'm not living in a box on the street.

28. Crossword puzzles. A much more productive way to kill time than watching TV or staring at Facebook, because you learn things, too. It's a mini brain workout, and it's fun! Win-win.

29. Pop Tarts. One of the only ways I will eat breakfast, is if we have Pop Tarts. And my stomach greatly appreciates when we do.

30. Life. You know...I couldn't experience any of this if I didn't have life. If Jesus hadn't died for me, if my parents hadn't wanted me, if I was in a country where Christians are persecuted...yet here I am, alive. So many of us take it for granted when really it's probably the greatest privilege we're given. Go life.

And thus concludes my one day of 30 days of thankfulness.

What are you thankful for?

And Then the Clouds Came Out.

My day was...stressful, mostly. Let me start at 7:00 this morning.

I had a speech today in speech class. A speech I was freaking out about. Especially since I had a dream the other night that I was COMPLETELY unprepared for it.

We had a lot of stuff to bring for it: an outline, a reference page, a visual aid, and a memory card so she could record us. I double checked last night to make sure I had everything I needed. And I checked again this morning.

Anyway, I got up early because I had to make sure I looked okay and everything, you know, cuz the whole class would be staring at me. My car was also out of gas, so I needed to stop at a gas station so that my car didn't break down or anything on my way to school.

So I leave earlier than normal to get gas and get there in plenty of time to prepare for my speech. It's 7:15 and I'm probably about 10 minutes away from my house when I remember a dream I had last night.

In my dream, it was speech day, and I didn't have my memory card. Thankfully, in my dream, the teacher had extra cards so it wasn't a big deal. But that got me thinking...did I pack my card? I didn't double check this morning to make sure I had it...did I pack it last night? I couldn't remember. So as I'm driving I have one hand in my bag digging around for it. And I can't find it. So I take the next exit, pull into a gas station, and do a thorough search of my bag. Nothing.

So now I'm starting to panic. I'm going to have to go home and get it. But what if it's not there? Then I would have just wasted about 20 minutes. So I decide to call my mom to have her check and see if it's still sitting on my desk. I call her twice, and there's no answer. So I start driving back. I decide to call my dad, even though I know he's at the airport dropping off my grandpa, just in case he's back already. But he's not. So, it's about 7:25 now and I run inside (leaving my car on because I don't have time to turn it off, and praying that no one steals it). Thankfully, it's still on my desk so I grab it and run. I'm in and out in about 30 seconds. Record time.

Anyway, I made it to school barely on time. I walked in right at 8, as opposed to about 7:30 when I would have gotten there had this little setback not happened. As you can imagine, I was a little frazzled the rest of the morning. And imagining everything that could go wrong. And feeling like I was going to throw up on the person in front of me (except no one sits in front of me, so I guess that's a plus).

But I think my speech went pretty well. Everything worked and I didn't forget anything and I stayed (barely) within the time limits. So, now I just have to wait for my evaluation.

By the way, I think the dream I had, and the fact that I remembered it before I was too far from home, was totally a God thing. Because He's awesome like that.

The next stressful thing that happened was one of my professors scheduled a test on a day that I'm not going to be in class...so now I have to talk to him and see if I can take it another time and then figure out a time I can take it which is going to be difficult because I have approximately 15 minutes of free time between the hours of 8 and 4 on weekdays. And I doubt he'll let me take the test at home.

And THEN to top it all off, I went to McDonald's for lunch and ordered my usual cheeseburger, plain and dry. PLAIN AND DRY. I go to eat my burger after I leave and it has ketchup, pickles, mustard, and onions on it. Not the definition of plain and dry.

So I had to wait until I got to work to eat it so I could scrape off all the gross stuff because it's hard to do that in the car. But by then, it was getting cold and the cheese was gross and the ketchup and mustard had absorbed into the bread. So, being the clever person that I am, I cut off the parts of the bread that I couldn't eat. And it still tasted terrible, and I almost threw up once (that's twice today, folks), but at least I wasn't hungry.

And then, as if it knew exactly how my day was going,  the sun disappeared and a billion clouds came out of nowhere and made the sky all gray and dark. I even took off my sunglasses. Y'all, I once wore my sunglasses while watching fireworks because they were too bright for my sensitive eyes. This is a big deal.

I kept thinking today was Tuesday, because normally these things happen to me on Tuesdays. (Tuesdays hate me, if you haven't heard). But thankfully, it is Thursday, tomorrow is Friday (Friday, Friday, gotta get down on Friday...haha. Now it's in your head.) and then it's the WEEKEND. My favorite word. (After euphemism, of course).

On the bright side, I was totally having a great hair day. It was all soft and everything.

So Sentimental.

Okay, I have a confession to make.

I......I miss high school.

There. I said it. The thing that I was so glad was over. I want it back.

Here's why: I don't like change.

I despise change. And college? College is change to the max. I don't like it. I want to go back.

I miss my little high school routine. School on Monday, Wednesday, Friday. Work on Tuesday and Thursday. Church on Wednesday night and Sunday. Kandu meetings every other week. Football games. Basketball games. Volleyball games. Plays. National honor society meetings. Knowing everyone in my entire school, and being best friends with everyone in my class.

I have not met anyone at UTA. Okay, I've met a couple people. But no new friends. Just acquaintances.

All I do is work and school. Work and school, school and work. Then I do some more school, go to bed, and start all over the next day. The highlight of my week is growth group on Tuesday nights. And church, of course.

So I've been feeling really sentimental lately. Looking back three years on my facebook profile, going through old pictures and videos, and really just wishing I had all that back...

And then the other day it hit me: just about when I'm going to be getting used to college life (next year), I'll be GRADUATING college, and then I once again have to dive into the deep abyss of the unknown.

I don't know what I'm going to do with myself.

I guess I just feel like a huge part of me is missing. You know, I was in high school for four years. I was super involved in my school and in my youth group, and now that's all been taken away from me. I hate being uninvolved...but I'm not going to be at UTA long enough to really get involved there. And we don't have a college group at church. So like...I'm just like a nobody right now.

Okay, I'm not really a nobody. I'm still involved in church, just not to the extent that I was in my youth group. I was a leader there, and now I'm back at the bottom of the totem pole.

I don't know how to explain why I'm struggling with this so much. I'm not type A, I don't like being in the middle of the things, I don't even really like leading. I guess it's just a big adjustment to make and, well, let's just say adaptability is not one of my top strengths. :)

Anyway, please join me in my sentimentality by looking at these pictures. (Disclaimer: There are A LOT. We're talking 4 years' worth.)

Decorating the tree. December 2008.

National History Day competition. February 2009.

Spring Retreat. March 2009.

 

 Missions garage sale. April 2009.

 Spring play. May 2009. (Yes I played an old lady.)

Thailand Mission Trip. June/July 2009.

 

 Spirit Week. October 2009.

 Volleyball. October 2009.

 

  Life Impact. January 2010.

Pine Cove. February 2010.

Spring Play. May 2010.

 Freshman Kidnap. June 2010.

 

California Mission Trip. July 2010.

 

Volleyball. October 2010. 

 Canada Mission Trip. June/July 2011. (As you can see, my junior year is poorly documented).

 

Women's Retreat. November 2011.

National Honor Society. December 2011.

 

HSM Band. Some point in 2011//2012.

Senior Progressive Dinner. February 2012.

 

 Prom. April 2012.

Spring Play. May 2012.

 

Speaking at church. May 2011.

 Senior Class. I miss these guys. May 2012.

Graduation. May 2012.

 Senior Trip. June 2012.

 

HEART. June 2012.

  

I would love to relive any one of these moments right now. You don't know what you've got until it's gone -- never have truer words been spoken.

Update. (Yep, That's All I've Got.)

 [Disclaimer: Before reading this post, it is important to note that I wrote this last Friday, with the intention of posting it on Friday. However, for some reason Blogger decided to completely shut down and not allow me to post anything until now. My teacher I think got confused and let us out of class 30 minutes early, so I decided to try again.]

So, the other day I was at Wendy's with a bunch of people and I totally dropped my entire tray of food on the floor. Surprised? Me either.

In other news...

I started college last week! It randomly started on a Thursday, and I figured out that's because we only get two days off for Thanksgiving break. Personally, I'd rather start on Monday and have the whole week off, especially since I'm probably going to be going out of town...but whatever. I'll just skip my classes. I'm in college. I can do that now.

Anyway, so I'm taking speech, critical thinking, psychology, and music appreciation. So far I have had no homework, except for a small speech in speech class.

It was an introductory speech. We had to introduce someone else in the class. So we had partners, and lucky for me my partner was a fifth year senior and showed me where my next class was on the first day of school. Anyway, our speeches were today, and throughout the whole speech, my partner called me Carla. Which, by the way, is not my name.

I think I know what happened. There's a girl named Carla in my class and she happens to sit right next to me. My mom's name is also Carla. My teacher was trying to remember all of our names and going through them got to Carla and I, and then made a joke that those are easy to remember because they're so similar. Then I said, "My mom's name is actually Carla." And I saw my partner right down in her notebook that my mom's name is Carla.

So I think that through her off. But now I'm concerned that I won't be getting my grade. Because the girl who's name IS Carla didn't go today because her partner wasn't there. And my teacher announced at one point that she didn't have Kayla marked down as having gone, to which of course I said I had. Anyway, the fact that that happened concerns me...because now I'm afraid Carla might be getting my grade even though she didn't go...

But she got the last name right, so maybe it'll all be okay.

Anyway. My second class is critical thinking. Which is my least favorite class. Because a) I took a class exactly like this in high school so I'm not learning anything yet, and b) of my four classes, this instructor is the least exciting. He's not bad at all...it's just, all my other instructors are better.

I love my psychology professor. Plus I love psychology. I think it's interesting and he makes it even more interesting.

And then there's the appreciation of music. Supposedly the easiest class at UTA, and I believe it. All we do in class really is listen to music and watch YouTube videos...there's discussion and stuff, but...yeah. It's easy.

So I have classes every morning until 11, then I go to work until 4, go home, eat dinner, and then do more school work pretty much until I go to bed which is why I haven't posted anything here in a long time...

And then there's the gas issue. I drive 30 minutes to school every morning. Then I drive an additional 30 minutes to work, and another 15 minutes home. Five days a week. Y'all. I filled up on gas on Sunday morning, and by the end of Wednesday I was at half a tank. I used to fill up once every two--maybe even three--weeks. In 4 days I used half my tank. And on top of it all, gas prices continue to go up...

Oh, and another thing...how do people gain weight in college? I am failing at this. In fact, I'm pretty sure that with the 15 minutes it takes to walk both ways between the campus and the parking lot, having to walk to the other end of campus just to get some food, and the severe lack of time I am finding to actually EAT, I'm actually losing weight.

At the moment, I'm enjoying a lunch I brought from home (because my wallet is crying from all the fast food I've been buying lately) and sitting at a picnic table by a lovely fountain I found. This is the best way, I've discovered, to actually enjoy my food, since usually I'm in such a rush. Here's a picture:

 

Check out the fountain in the background!

 

Oh, and if you're wondering about my hair, yes! I got a haircut. I'm trying out bangs again, though they're a little long. Partly because it's been a few weeks, and partly because they were always like that. But please don't judge by the picture -- it's not very good.

Anyway, I've still got a few minutes, but I've run out of things to say and I've just about finished my lunch, so I guess I'm going to go now. I CANNOT wait for Monday -- no school, no work. Labor day may be my new favorite holiday. (I'm sure that'll change when Christmas rolls around, but right now, it's my favorite holiday.)

Happy early labor day!

[UPDATE: I got my speech score back. 47/50, not bad. I think that's a 94. Anyway, the good thing is I got my score, not Carla. The bad thing is, the name Karla is written on my evaluation sheet, and I think I may be getting called that the rest of the semester in that class. Oh well, at least it's just a few months, and what's a name, really? And oh my gosh I think a squirrel just tried to kill me with an acorn...]