Merilyn’s blog

I've decided to try and keep a list of all the books that I've read and am reading. There could be more that I'm forgetting and this list doesn't include most of the books that were studied in my Literature classes because I can't honestly say I read every single page of those books... Oh well, here it is, it'll stay on top for a while.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone   (JK Rowling)
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets   (JK Rowling)
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban   (JK Rowling)
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire   (JK Rowling)
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix   (JK Rowling)
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince   (JK Rowling)
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows   (JK Rowling)
Who Killed My Daughter?   (Lois Duncan)
Belladonna   (Karen Moline)
The Dresden Files: Storm Front   (Jim Butcher)
The Dresden Files: Fool Moon   (Jim Butcher)
The Dresden Files: Grave Peril   (Jim Butcher)
The Dresden Files: Summer Knight (Jim Butcher)
The Dresden Files: Death Masks (Jim Butcher)
The Dresden Files: Blood Rites (Jim Butcher)    [IN PROGRESS]
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy   (Douglas Adams)   [IN PROGRESS]
The Hundred Secret Senses   (Amy Tan)
Of Mice and Men   (John Steinbeck)
The Great Gatsby   (F. Scott Fitzgerald)
To Kill a Mockingbird   (Harper Lee)

So I finally got back to school Sunday night and have already had my first classes. So far they're pretty okay although I don't have much to go off of obviously.

Data Analysis doesn't seem too bad but the Prof, while nice, is also demanding and has rather strict rules. I hope I can keep up.

I got lost on my way to Digital Foundations because I very foolishly misread the location of the class as being in building 70 when it's actually in 07. Sadly, I don't think I have any classes in 70 anymore and it's my absolute favorite building to be in. :( The Prof isn't the most exciting but hopefully the material will interest me once we actually start working on labs and the like. (Which reminds me that I need to print that out for today's lab!)

Imaging Science is interesting although the first day's material was pretty basic.

The only class I have left is Newswriting but I'm not sure if I'll keep it or not. It ends at 9:50 at night and my next class is at 8:00 in the morning the following day so I'd basically be coming back and heading straight to bed. Not only that but by then, Petals will be closed so my least meal will be at about 5:00 and I won't be heading to bed until 11:00 or later. So 6 hours without any food...that might not be 100% pleasant...

I'm going to see how this week goes and if it seems doable, I'll stick with it. If not, I'm just going to drop Newswriting since it was the last class I added anyways and it's so doggone late at night!

This has been the crappiest break I've ever had and it's all because my family basically sucks.

When my Gram wrote up her will, she cut certain people out for different reasons. Some ignored her so she figured, "Why give them money? They don't even come to visit." Others are living lives she disapproves of and while I don't entirely agree with that controlling aspect of her personality, it was her right to cut them out just like it was their right to go their own way. But when she wrote them out, it infuriated them and people have been fighting and manipulating one another for much of the last decade.

The reason this has become such a huge problem as of late is because my Gram is dying. She smoked for 40+ years and now her lungs are shot. They're filling up with fluid and she has or might have cancer and she caught bronchitis so it's basically a full frontal assault on her lungs. She knows she's dying so she wanted to come home and die there rather than in a hospital. But what she did wrong is she shot her mouth off and made my Mom's life incredibly hard in doing so.

Instead of just making these changes to her will quietly, she told everyone. So now that they know, they're mad and they're treating my Mom like crap because she's getting everything. They're taking all the easy shifts while loading the night shifts on my Mom which means she has to stay awake from 10:00pm to 7:00am all by herself. Not only that but two of them, previously mentioned in other entries, keep picking at her and taking swipes at her.

Even though my Gram is sick and dying, I'm really mad at her. She's so hardheaded and spoiled that she thought she could shoot her mouth off like usual and still get her way. Not so. Instead, she put her daughter, my mother, in a terrible predicament. I can't believe she was dense enough to think that she could boss people around and cut them out of the will and then have them care for her. Especially in this family...almost everyone is a selfish, uncaring, unemployed, nasty bum. She should have known better. As soon as my Pappy died, everyone ran in and started claiming items and yet she still trusted these people. Ugh, whatever.

As bad as this may sound...I really hope my Gram doesn't live a whole lot longer. She's not recovering, she's barely holding on, and my Mom is so worn out and upset that she's not eating and when she does, she generally gets sick and throws up anyways. Not only is she not recovering but she's not coherent either. She barely talks to anyone and she's no where near as sharp as she was a few weeks ago. It hurts but...there's nothing left. I went to see her yesterday and almost started crying because I usually talk to her about school and the like but she didn't even really acknowledge me. I realized then that I'll likely never get to tell her about changing majors or my trip home or anything I saw or heard on campus. Nothing. It kills me to say this but to me, she's practically already dead...the Gram I knew isn't there, she doesn't exist. :(

And then it hits me...I'm still scheduled for 8:00am classes 3 days a week...and I want to cry even more, I feel so frustrated. I'm nervous about school and I don't know what to do about my Mom. What if my Gram doesn't die until I go back to school? I have to come back but my schedule already seems tough, what do you even do in that sort of situation? Not only that but I don't want my Mom to be alone...and I know she misses me and she's being ripped away from me every time they put her on the schedule for a 6+ hour shift.

Growing up sucks. :(

I was only home two days before someone was taking swipes at me and I'm not at all surprised that it was my nearly 40 year old cousin who was doing it. And I can't believe that I didn't get her back! Ugh...fail...

I guess I'm too nice or something because no matter how many times someone is nasty to me, I almost never expect it of them again and they catch me off guard. But now that I think back on her comments I realize just how jealous she is and feel encouraged to continue doing what I'm doing just to further rub her the wrong way.

First she commented that because it might take me an extra year to graduate that I could be a "professional college student" and her brother said, "You know, a guy I know did that!"

1. My school's programs are generally more than four years' worth of work anyways from what I understand. We do four years plus work a certain amount of time. That's more than four years and that's why we have a quarter system so that we can get out in four years. If we did semesters, it'd take longer so taking five years, IMO, isn't that huge of a deal.

2. Her brother doesn't know anyone who did that. He's a bum, he doesn't know anyone who went to college period save for his sister who thinks the rest of her family are such retarded (their fave adjective!) losers that she doesn't even talk to them anymore.

Then she said that she knew someone who went to college and wound up at Burger King. Said person might have, coincidentally enough, went to college for the same thing that I am now but I can't remember. This is the second time she's said something like this. It's almost like she's trying to reassure herself that college isn't important, it doesn't mean anything and I can still fail and she's hoping and praying that I'll screw up so she has to keep saying it -- "It's okay, it's okay, she's not in the clear yet, if I tell her she can fail maybe she will!"

1. I know going to college doesn't get you a great job just because. I also know that it's not so unimportant that all college grads end up flipping burgers for a living so give it up.

2. Her first horror story regarding her sister is irrelevant whether it's true or not. Her sister, from what I've heard, is a Graphic Designer, not a Web Designer so in comparing the two of us a year or so ago, she was very much mistaken. They aren't the same thing. Not only are they not the same thing but according to her, her sister never left the state or maybe even the county in pursuit of a job. She's still not very far away from home so I wouldn't be surprised if, OMG! She didn't get a job within driving distance of her hometown. It just doesn't happen. But that doesn't reflect the overall state of the job market.

3. Her newest horror story is just as ridiculous as the first. It's very nearly impossible that someone she knows is doing or did the same thing I am now. It's a relatively new major. It didn't even exist 10 years ago let alone 20. Neither did the iPod and the internet wasn't nearly as powerful as it is today. Between now and then, things have changed so much that the whole Publishing industry itself has been edited, shifted, and modified beyond anything that people could have predicted back when she was my age.

4. If both of her stories are of people who failed to get a job in their chosen profession...boy, she must know a lot of losers. So what does that say about her then? *smirk*

Oh, she also remarked that living in NYC is so expensive and how someone she knew was "shocked by just the rent!" The only dig I got in there, if you could even call it that, was to say, "Which is why you have to know how to make that amount of money." I don't know if she got what I was saying which was -- "And you don't because you're a loser whose only contribution to the world was getting pregnant three times and selling Tupperware."

1. You don't have to go to NYC for publishing...a lot of things are published -- labels, books, magazines, mail, posters, THE WEB, etc.. Only the uneducated make that assumption.

2. Who said I was going to NYC? Who said I was staying here? Someone is really giving my future some thought and I don't mean me...

But above all, whatever I decide to do will be better than anything she has ever done or will ever do. She has no desire to work because she's just too lazy. So now she wants me to fail because she's jealous.

Mind you, all of this was being said in the hospital where my Gram is sick and suffering. She's so jealous and hateful that any time she's around me, she can't help herself, she has to insult me somehow or show off. Actually, I should say insult me and show off. She was bragging about her kids to my Mom after that, it's really pathetic and I can't wait to get away from such horrible people.

In the end, I just have to remember that by following my heart, making smart decisions, and working hard, I'm "winning" in more ways than one and that's all that's going to count in the end.

W00t, this quarter is practically over for me! I took my Mass Communications final this morning at 8:00am...and on no sleep mind you! I just wasn't tired which I fully contribute to the fact that I'm not at all healthy but no worries, I'm working on it! Once I start working out regularly and eating better, hopefully my sleeping habits will shape up, too.

All that I need to do now is read about 150 discussion board postings (meh), take two online quizzes, and then take my online final. Oh, and figure out my financial situation. I don't know what's up with my account because apparently New Media Publishing students get charged $98 a quarter for equipment and the like. This charge was added onto my account late (since I changed majors mid-quarter) so I called the school and asked which amount was due since two were listed (this was before I figured out why there was a difference between my "account balance" and "current balance"). They said that the "current balance" was due...which didn't include the $98. So now all that's left is the $98 but no mention of when they want it... We would have paid it already if it weren't for Dad coming up a bit short so it's not a huge deal, I'd just like to know when the deadline is.

A more annoying issue involves my meal plan. I get all debit so I can spend it where I want and when I want. The problem is that I'm running really low this quarter which has never happened before so I need to work out a better plan next time. Anyways, last night I got a snack at a vending machine. When it updated my account, it said that I had $29.66. This morning, I got breakfast. It cost $9.90. I asked the cashier if they accepted Tiger Bucks (which is money that you can use on books and the like, not just food, but it's taxed). I think this confused her and made her think that I wanted to use it since I have $20 in TB. I explained that I was only asking for future reference because I didn't want to run out of cash in my debit account, assume that I can use TB, and then find out, whoops, not accepted here at the Inn.

Well, when I went to pay I guess it didn't go through. So she scanned my card again and it said there was insufficient funds. What?... So then she ran it through as TB which means I got charged tax. Where the heck did my money go?!?!?! So now I'm waiting on an email from the school because I really don't want to have to ask my Dad for money. He's been pretty mad lately, mad at his uncle, and he's taking it out on everyone. Well, actually...truth be told, he's just not very nice in general, not even on a good day. So I'm trying to scrimp and save to keep from having to ask for more food money. It's not pleasant but I won't die, I'm hardly starving, it's just a little rougher than it should have been. But someone posted a lovely website on Facebook recently that actually tracks how much money you can spend per day according to when you are leaving the school, what day it is, and how much money you have left so I'll be using that next quarter for sure.

So today the gameplan is to rest up after a night of no sleeping and then clean up my room and maybe do an online quiz if I feel up to it. If not, I'll have to do at least one tomorrow to be safe. And either way, I really should read some of those discussion postings tonight to keep from getting stuck with them all at the last minute. God, some of them are darn boring... >.>

Oh, this is killing me! It's torturous! I forgot my books at home! Well actually I brought the wrong ones. Somehow, I grabbed two of the later books in the series rather than the ones that were actually coming up next. I started reading the one and was like, "Wait, what? When did Harry [insert development]?" And knowing what sort of stuff is coming up later makes me really really miss being able to read the series. I miss carrying one of them around with me to read at random. I miss seeing the artwork and turning the pages. *sigh*

I got really antsy last night and wanted to read really badly but couldn't. I even wound up searching my room for a book that I was in the mood to read only to realize that I had somehow neglected to bring any. And yet I wonder...did I unload everything from my car?...You know, that just now occurred to me...I think I'm going to look...

Darn it! Nothing! Hoooow did I do this? I remember thinking that I should be mature about packing and only bring stuff that I anticipated needing and/or wanting which is why I planned on bringing the next two books in the Dresden Files series. But somewhere along the line, I very foolishly picked up the wrong two books, leaving behind the two that I'm supposed to read. On paper, leaving behind all the other books that I'm interested in was a good idea because I knew that I'd focus in on the Dresden Files anyways...but transferring plans from paper to real life doesn't always work out...

At least my car is fixed. Sort of. Apparently, when my Dad was changing the brake pads...or whatever it was that he was doing down there around the brake area...he put something on incorrectly and a clip broke/slipped. When it did so, it slid sort of sideways and began rubbing on the rotors which is where the screeching noise was coming from. So the mechanic I took my car to simply took off the clip. He said that it's not dangerous but I might hear a rubbing/shaking sort of noise. Even better, he did it for free! I asked about payment and he said not to worry about it because he understood the situation since his son went away for college, too.

I haven't been feeling right, though. My head has been hurting and I've been sleeping a lot. I'm tired even now. I've been really bored, too. WoW isn't holding my attention as much as it used to and I don't want to watch movies on my laptop because it's a pain. I think I'll just take a break from my computer, my head is really starting to throb.

Nine men have been executed for taking part in ethnic rioting that left nearly 200 people dead in July, the first suspects put to death in the unrest, Chinese state media reported Monday.

[cut]

"The United States and the European Union did not put any pressure on China or seek to intervene and for that we are extremely disappointed," he said.

[Source]

Soo...they wanted us to intervene? Don't we usually get crapped on for doing that? Told that we're condescending and bossy and arrogant? That we should mind our own business? Correct me if I'm wrong but I hear that quite often online and now we're in the wrong because we didn't intervene? And people say that we're dumb...

Another bad night. I'll admit that my sleeping schedule isn't what it should be but I don't think it should matter if I go to bed at 3:00am instead of 11:00pm. I mean, yeah, the latter is a lot better for a college student with commitments but, unless I'm very mistaken, I should be just as able to fall asleep at 3:00am as I should be at 11:00pm if I'm tired. Right?

I just kept tossing and turning though and now I don't feel well. My stomach is upset and I can remember feeling so warm at one point that I got up and turned on the air even though it's November and typically pretty chilly in here when I don't have the heat on. I don't know what's wrong but I do this pretty regularly and sometimes my stomach burns in the morning. Not hurts or is upset but actually burns. I suppose I should ask about this, if not because I'm worried but to keep myself out of class. >.>

This, of course, brings me back to my rant about class being mandatory. The last time I went like this I fell asleep and I don't do that sort of thing unless I'm nearly dead. So I emailed the professor to say look...I haven't slept. I've been tossing and turning and my stomach is upset. I wouldn't normally go to the Health Center for this but it doesn't change the fact that I feel miserable and sitting through a class like this would be torturous. I've already missed two classes so I was afraid to just not show up even though my grades have been good...what can I do? If he wants me there and doesn't mind me possibly falling asleep then whatever but I find it ridiculous that my name is on all of these loans and I'm 21 years old and can't just say, "I feel sick, I'm not going." It makes me feel like a little kid again and not in a "Yay, it's Disney World!" kinda way...

And crap! I just realized that I had scheduled a meeting with my adviser...I don't even know what day I had it planned for but I know that I missed it. Not only that but I forget the day that I'm supposed to meet with the nutritionist. I need to get organized and start using that white/pink board of mine. Meh, if the professor doesn't get back to me by a certain time and I still don't feel well, I'm calling into the Health Center, my stomach is starting to burn a bit, this sucks. >_<

If you could only drink one beverage for the rest of your life (not including water), which one would you choose?

MOUNDS BAR MILKSHAKE!!!!!

Or Mountain Dew Voltage. Mmmmm....