Well, I was actually doing some work, but I got stuck, so I'm waiting for Becca to finish so she can help me. Meanwhile, I might tell you about my day.

I slept quite well. I woke up very poorly though. Oh, I longed to be back in the bed, happily dreaming of nonsensical things. But alas, it was not meant to be.

I got my grade on the midterm by emailing my TA. Slava gave me the news of 32.3%, which by any standards is just plain retarded. Even with the curve, that's still an F. What am I doing? That's just silly.

Kelly forgot to upload the lecture notes, so everybody had to take notes by hand. It was hard to stay awake. Nobody knows what went on. We were all half asleep.

On that note, I went back to my room and took a nap in my hammock. Oh, it was lovely. My feet were cold though, since gravity forces the middle downward, making the feet higher than the heart, draining them of blood and feeling. So I curled into a little ball. It was a nice 45 minute nap, then Tony came in and I felt like I needed to get something done.

So I rolled over and started surfing the internet. Then I signed online and my mother started yakking at me. In order to type back, I had to get out of the hammock. Thanks a lot, Mom.

But I did some stuff. Not stuff that really mattered. Or was of any note.

Math lecture was equally as confusing/sleepy as Chem. Except it was funnier since Stupid Questions Girl kept on whimpering about how she didn't understand anything. That's one of the many problems with that type of person. Just shut up and figure it out on your own. You're always asking stupid questions, so we know you don't understand anything. Voicing it doesn't do anything but annoy me. So shut up.

After that, I did some more stuff. Well, not really. I packed up and went to New Testament.

There we finished the gospels and went on to more content. The birth of Jesus. Interestingly, His birth wasn't necessarily a virgin birth. The original Hebrew word that was quoted from Isaiah simply meant "young woman," which usually implied that she was a virgin. In translating to Greek, however, they chose a word more close to "virgin." Even so, in the first couple of centuries CE, there wasn't a huge emphasis on the virgin birth, but rather something that was adopted later on, becoming a pivotal point in religion. So that's the little religion tidbit of the day.

After that, I read the assigned reading in Metzger, then played my trumpet. Oh, I was sounding beautiful today. It was really pretty. It felt so awesome too. Man.

I ate at the DC. Meh.

Off to New Testament discussion. I forgot my light, but while riding, I realized that there are more people without lights than there are with. But I also learned how easily it could be to get hit without one. Bikers without lights are invisible at night.

We went on a field trip. It was pretty exciting. We walked the hundred or so feet to Shield's Library. We needed to go to the second floor, so Fransisco directed us to the elevator. Twenty people in an elevator to go one flight of stairs.

We fuddled around there, learning where to research our topics, then got back in the elevator to go back downstairs to a different part. Oh, how silly. Then I went home.

It's been a while since I last ate. I'm kind of hungry. I need more snacky things. The bars are good, but it's a breakfast thing for me. I need them in the morning, so eating them at other times just seems wrong. By the way, I finished one box of Powerbars last week. I have yet to open the other, trying to finish off the granola bars first. I enjoy the softness of the Powerbars, yet they are smaller than Balance bars, so I have to eat two to tide me over, thus making them go by faster.

I did some of my Chem lab, due tomorrow. I miss racquetball. I will play tomorrow morning. Wheee. I've been stretching my arm. It's been getting sore.

Now I think I'll check on Becca and maybe get in my pjs. Or go to sleep. Nah. Check on Becca.

Actually, today has been pretty boring. As I sit here reviewing the day, there really is nothing of note. I mean, seriously. Let me recap the boringness.

I woke up, blah blah blah. I decided to wear my yellow and brown stripey tie from France. But I thought the brown shoes looked a little odd with the grey slacks. So I went with the black shoes. But Darren was so wearing the same shoes in meeting. I should have gone with the brown because it would have been so less embarrassing.

See, that sounds like a girl. And all girls are boring. So therefore my day was boring. Continue.

The Coulters were in meeting today. It was kind of awkward, so I tried to avoid them by awkwardly turning my body making it look like I was already in a deep conversation with Brandon, a little kid, or a plant. They left. I felt relieved, yet sad that I didn't really get the chance to see how their lives are going. More relieved though.

Brandon, Ridders and I went to The Grad for lunch. I got the Gradburger, 1/2 lb of juicy beef. It was fed to the Jeffmonster, slightly more than 1/2 lbs of dry skin and bones. It was rather tasty though. The burger, not myself.

We took a little trip over to Brandon's digs, where it turns out all his roomates were. I finally got to meet the ever elusive Roger. He doesn't really live there. Riddy watched the game, Brandon, Joe, and AJ studied for bio, and I, well, I didn't really do anything. I made fun of Brandon when he got things wrong. I went through his pictures and found me in the background. And Jayna.

See, it was really boring.

Gospel meeting was interesting, since the three of us manly boys had to go to the bathroom right beforehand. It was Dick and Kent again. Harold is off with his mother. Afterwards, I made fun of the relatives, admired the hot pink outfits of the Barry girls, and weasled my way back to the dorms with Brandon.

Since then, I've been a nuisance. Since my main form of procrastination has been shut down temporarily for maintenence, I've been aimlessly wandering the halls again. I've also been desperately trying to find something to do. The people that live here are starting to hate me, all because of tonight.

The Chem midterm scores were supposed to be posted Friday night, but they're still not up. I have no proof I failed that test. It makes me sad. So I sent a bitter email to Slava, hoping she would take offense and fix the situation. Probably not. Tomorrow's lecture notes aren't even up.

I wanted to go to the ARC and do something, but I've been forcing myself not to exert any unnecessary forces on my right arm, since after playing racquetball on Friday, it was searing with pain. Couldn't use it for anything. So I'm hoping by Tuesday it will get better. It was sad having to decline three separate offers to go, one from Rids, one from Tyson, and one from Chris, David, and Doug. Sad. How will I ever lose weight?

Now I need to go to the lounge and see if they're done making ravioli. Because I can hopefully snag some. Free food. Yes.

Then I'll get ready for bed and probably read. I have a hundred or so pages to read by tomorrow. Wow. I've been procrastinating.

Well, it's true.

So I wasted away my day by sleeping gloriously in until 11:30 or so. Got dressed, did my normal stuff. Ate brunchfast at the DC.

A little while after that, Riddy called to see if I wanted to go bowling. So he came over while I was at the piano attempting to transcribe "Martha" by Tom Waits. We hung out for a bit, meaning watched golf on the TV in the lounge. I was too tired to care.

So at 3:20, we met Brandon and Joe at the bowling alley. It was pretty fun. I was having a surprisingly good day. I need to start bowling more often. Get back into the swing of things. I bowled 117 and 111. Not too shabby for my normal standards, but not too good for anyone else's though. I need to get the hook down.

After that, Riddy and I went to In-N-Out for early dinner, opting to go to the Grad tomorrow. I've developed a nice fondness for In-N-Out. I think the franchise here serves wonderful burgers.

Getting back to the dorms, I didn't really do a whole lot. Just hung out with people on my floor. Getting to know Jess, one of the new girls. Helping her with her computer problems, which is risky, I know. But I ate the rest of her pizza. Not bad.

Laughed at some more drunk people. Tucked Rachel into bed. Watched Patrick play guitar. Not all that abnormal. But I'm tired. I need to get some rest.

As it is 1:30 am, I will try and keep this short for my sake.

After relatively uneasy dreams, I awoke to the sound of my beeping alarm, then the feeling of urgency to study. Too bad. The bathroom was being cleaned at the moment, although it was an hour before it's designated time. Honestly. Why choose 8-9 am to clean the bathrooms? There's going to be nobody needing to use it, obviously.

I took my Chem Midterm. It gave me a serious smack down. Oddly, I felt happy about it though. I was in such a great mood that when I found I didn't lock my bike, I just stood there for a whole minute, just laughing at myself. Ha.

I did some stuff. Oh, I played racquetball with Doug. I was swinging too hard, so I'm going to force myself not to play for a few days. I've been a little sore for the past couple of days, but this was just a searing pain that made me unable to use my arm. It was bad. I had to cuddle up in my hammock for an hour or so.

Went to math lecture. I sat next to the stupid questions girl (the cute one that has a name: Tonya), and was amused by her. When Grishin casually mentioned an important part of the lecture, she worridly turned to me and asked, "Is he going to explain that?" to which I smiled and stated blankly, "Yes." And immediately he did.

Oh, Grishin. Today he had an interview, so he was wearing a suit and tie. But don't worry, the shirt was way too big (collar was too loose and the sleeves stuck out too much). No belt, either. And of course, there were his trusty Vans.

After some more hammocking, I got Elizagerth and went to New Testament. The Gospel according to John is what we covered. It's pretty amazing actually. Apparanly 92% of it is unique to John. Meaning only 8% is shared with the other three gospels.

Blah blah blah. At 5:45, Brandon picked me up to go to the Flecks. It was a nice little get together. Ate some food, played some music. Fun times. I'm sure you can picture it.

I got back and talked to some people on the floor. I sang in falsetto to Patrick's guitar. I helped one of the new girls fixy up her computer. Oh, good times. Now it is late, I am hungry, and tired.

Bye.

I've noticed I'm getting so lazy I usually sit in my chair sideways so I don't have to swing them over the chair and under the desk. I am pathetic.

This morning was a difficult one. After racquetball last night, I was sleeping very well. But then there was my chem discussion this morning at 8. Everybody was falling asleep. It was no good. I'm sure we were learning stuff, but it just wasn't getting into my head. At all. I don't think anybody in that room was awake, including Slava. Also, on the way there, I saw Chrissy, who was riding her longboard and late to class, so I pulled her to Wellman. I realized how skinny I am. It's disgusting.

After Chem, I biked to the ARC. I actually played racquetball for another hour. John and I partnered up against Eric and Sterling. It made for two good matches. We barely won both of them. The second match was much more brutal, since we were holding them at 14 for quite some time, but managed to get back up there and win.

I was exhausted. I went home intending on taking a nap. Stupid internet.

My goals for the day have been to do my math homework, take a nap, and study for my chem miterm tomorrow morning. One out of three is pathetic. Surprisingly, I did my math homework. Granted, I just now finished it, but still, I closed my eyes only momentarily, not quite enough to be considered a nap.

I think maybe yesterday I was reacquainted with Emma Wascher randomly. Nice girl. Huh.

Lunch and dinner were both good. For lunch, since I always go in the quiet ten minutes right before the storm, I told the girl serving food that I would like an enchilada then feign going back in line and get a second. So she served me one, I spun around, and she served me another. Oh the joys. Ocean in view.

A roasted chicken for dinner. Wasn't bad. I really liked the skin. There also was beef stew in a bread bowl. Good bread. And amazingly enough, the stew was better than convention stew.

Well, I've been wasting away at the computer, finding new things to procrastinate on. For instance, there apparantly is a secret organization here at Davis, dating back to the founding of the school, called "Sword and Sandals." Whatever. I need a life.

So I think the plan will be to take a shower, then maybe open the book, do the sample midterm, and shoot myself for being such a retard. Good? Cool.

My computer is really slow right now. I think it's just the internet connection though. Programs seem to be opening just fine.

Today was a normal Wednesday of the weekly routine. Except in Chem we went over the sample midterm, since our first one is on Friday. Except the sample midterm he went over was the second midterm, but we didn't realize this until most of the hour had elapsed. Then we had Stupid Questions Girl behind me and to the right ask insanely stupid questions. After he went over a phase change graph, she had him explain the entire thing again. Someone deserves to be taken out back and shot.

I got back to my room and did some math homework. It was so unusual, when Tony walked in the room, he gasped. I feel good. Now if only I can finish it.

Lunch was pretty good. I mean, I actually went back for more.

I got all of my heavy stuff and went to math.

Oh, math made me so mad. Grishin wasn't there, so he had one of the TA's come in and give the lecture. But it jus so happened to be my TA, the one whom I so passionately despise. I miss Rick Danner. None of this Robin Whatever business. Rick Danner could do math. Robin just fiddles around with stuff, not actually accomplishing anything. He is the reason I don't go to the discussions. Because he's terrible. Grishin is really good at math and is very good at explaining things. He just has a very thick Russian accent and is soft spoken so nobody can understand him. Unless you're me. So everybody hates Grishin. And when Robin was teaching, all he did was examples. You pretty much had to learn the rules yourself. And even when he was copying the examples he did from a piece of paper, he screwed up halfway through and couldn't even finish it. So he did his default, "The main point is what I did at the beginning." Man, he's a terrible educator. And what made it worse was that after class was over, everybody started applauding him. Why? Because he doesn't have an accent? Stupid racists.

Enough of that rant. I got my heavy stuff and nearly fell over on the way to the music building.

One thing I should mention. Trumpet Ensemble is the most fun I ever have. Well, it's high up there at least. The people there all play trumpet so are all of the same mentality. Meaning all the jokes are understood and funny. So I feel completely at home. Everybody can brutally make fun of everybody else and we're all on the floor laughing.

Nick and I have this sort of relationship. We usually are playing the same part, so we're usually sharing a stand. We have jokes about stand height. One time he said, "it's not that hard... I'm just a retard." So I call him retarded quite often. And he makes height jokes. Even Scott finds it funny. I'm sure it's just one of those things you had to be there for though...

New Testament was great. As usual.

After that, I was going to take a nap but got sidetracked. So I ate dinner then waited for Riddy and Allen to come pick me up. Brandon was in Chico.

Meeting felt different, mainly because I was sitting in a different seat. Daryl was in Washinton DC.

Afterwards, Riddy, Allen and I went to In-N-Out because Riddy didn't eat dinner. Neither Allen nor myself were hungry, but Riddy bought us food anyway. Silly boy.

I got back to my room and did some nonsense, then at 11 I went to play racquetball with Tyson. It's now 1 am and I am sore and tired. And I have to get up early tomorrow to play racquetball. Oof.

I need to. But I also need to get some sleep. Hmph.

I woke up early for racquetball. I got there half an hour early and Eric showed me some drills to work on and then we played a match. Class started. We played doubles. It was a pretty even match. I need to get out there more.

It wasn't until I got all of my stuff and biked over to the Music building that I realized this. I have been so sore the entire day. I hate it when I'm doing something and a certain muscle gets a searing pain. Bah.

Improv was great. We got a new song, Monk this time. We worked more on resolving lines. Got a bass player too. Hope he stays.

Then I got back to the room and did some nonsense. Quite a bit, actually. I really ought to have gotten some work done.

I was over by the bookstore so I got some money from the ATM. I recall Dad saying he put $100 in the Wells Fargo account for breakfast foods, so I took that out to use for eating necessities. Not random expenses.

Since the ATM is by the bookstore, I went inside. I ended up getting $20 worth of books. Feeling good that I wasn't going to use the money I just took out, I paid with my debit card. But that wasn't working. And the line was long. So I offered to pay with cash. Blast.

Later, I went to my Chem lab where all we did was go over the questions. Great lab. Slava is actually pretty good. Fun.

I got back and borrowed Napoleon Dynamite from Liz next door. It was pretty awesome. Patheticly awesome.

Now here I am. My day was incredibly boring. Not to mention my telling of the day. I really need to start making up stuff.

Now I'm back. I'm trying to get more sleep, I promise. Bah.

By the way, the name of the restaurant we ate at for lunch on Saturday was Rose Pistola. It was delicious.

Woke up, blah blah blah. Chem was blah. We sat there watching ice melt. He needs more exciting demos.

I went back and read. And talked to Jesse from OE online. Apparanly now he writes cell phone rings. How utterly specific is that?

I read some more. Probably had 70 pages needing to be read. Most of was skimmed.

Math was pretty boring. But funny, since Grishin actually made some jokes. I was the only one laughing because most people didn't realize it was a joke. Or even that he was still talking. Man, I love that guy.

Read some more. Oh, and I changed the Brita filter. That process shouldn't take as long as it does.

New Testament was as usual. We finished up the gospel according to Mark and moved on to Matthew. It's amazing the differences between the gospels. More than you would imagine.

Back to the dorms. Read some more, ate dinner. Read. Then went to discussion.

Getting there two minutes early, I found the quiz was already being taken. Wow. Fransisco is on top of things. We broke into groups according to astrological sign, a process that took nearly the same amount of time as the group work. Good times.

I got back, blah blah blah. I did my improv homework of writing a descending line within the chords. Then I went to the piano and played. Apparantly it's very loud from the study room.

After that, I went to see what Claire was doing since it's been a while since the last time I visited her. Joe was in the room, so we chatted for a bit. Blah blah blah. I really need more sleep.

I really need to get to sleep and catch up on that miserable awakening this morning, but I am due for a little details of the greatness that was this weekend, so perhaps I'll fake some of those 20 chapters I have to read.

Friday night, Patrick and I packed up and got on the road in his Subaru WRX. We listened to blues the whole way there.

We got to his brother's art opening around 8. It was Gallery 16 at 1616 16th street. Silly them. The art was amazing. Modern stuff, but still cool. Really thick layers of paint, layers upon layers, the raised so they're spiky. Some of them were shaved off as to show the marbling that the other colors produced. Good times.

We got back to Patrick's place maybe 10 or 11. We had to go looking for his homeless friend that Pat got a gig at KDVS where he deejays. But alas, he was gone for the weekend. So back to their place.

Patrick warned me that the have a very humble apartment in downtown San Fransisco. I was expecting dirty rats running around. Well, the square footage is nothing to be ashamed of. First floor was the garage that housed his dad's Mercedes SL 55 AMG and, oh, I forget... another Merc. He loaded his luggage into their elevator as we walked up the stairs.

Second floor is his dad's office. Third floor is the bedrooms. Pat's room has a dozen instruments lying around. I slept in the guest room.

Upstairs is the living room, dining room, and kitchen. Complete with views of the bay and city. Not at all shabby.

I remembered. It's on Telegraph Hill Road, which turns into Lombard. By Coit tower.

So Patrick played all of his intruments (12 and 6 string guitars, backpacker guitar, banjo, soprano and baritone ukuleles, mandolin, concertina). I played the piano.

We did some morning stuff. Pat slept in, so his mom made me breakfast. She kept on insisting that it was her role as a Jewish mother to feed me. I got so sick of kindly refusing, then having it forced upon me anyway, I was eating everything by the end. It was a lovely breakfast though. Bowl of pineapple, fried eggs, toast, juice, tea.

I played the piano some more. Pat got up, we went out to lunch with his parents.

We walked there. Rose something. Down a big hill and through a little park where people were relaxing and playing with their dogs. Oh, the dog came along. Everyone loves her.

Dinner was beyond excellent. For more details, contact Glen Lee at Cookstr@aol.com.

After that, we had nap time. It was pleasant.

At 8:30, we got ready and such, then went out to get some ice cream (sherbert) and pick up the tickets. Due to a lack of parking, I hopped out while Pat circled the block. Outside the theatre, I met Raizin, a member of Olde English whose face I was very familiar with. Rather excited, I got back in Patrick's car and we went back to pack.

Since Pat had to pack everything, we ended up leaving about well after we should have been there to get a good place in line. Said our goodbyes and thank yous then left. He dropped me off and found a parking spot.

Luckily, a few days prior, I started posting on the OE message board. So I knew a few people that were going to be there, two of which flew from Seattle. Not surprisingly, they were at the front of the line. So I casually introduced my physical self and joined them. When the doors opened, we went to the front. Pat found me and all.

Olde English is ten times funnier live. There are certain sketches that are just so perfect. They have a great blend of live and video performances. It was everything I could have asked for, including a recently retired sketch called "Swastikats." Wow. Unforgettable.

During intermission, we chilled (literally) outside with OE. They were so excited to have national fans. They were even more enthusiastic than we were. It was funny because after introducing ourselves, I would mention that I'm engrish, then there would be a big "Oh!" Good times.

The headliner was a group called "Totally Looped," comprised of Second City actors and other people too. The voice of Homer Simpson included. Anyway, their deal was they would show video clips and dub them over with new plots. Great concept, could have been done more effectively though. The announcer was hilarious though. His character was completely wasted and hilarious. He even had the awkwardness of lack of funny thought down perfectly. But Homer was kind of a jerk.

After the show, I was congratulating OE again, then going to buy their DVD. But Tavit warned me against that since they tacked on an extra charge for the show. He told me to hold on, then ran backstage. It turns out it was only $2, but whatever. So we waited around a little bit, Patrick getting harrassed by Gail Matthias, from Totally Looped. We finally left for home. A few blocks away, I get a call from Lily (Seattle) saying that Tavit has the DVD. So we turned around and I picked it up for $10. The problem was, I was going to pay with credit card since I'm all out of cash and haven't been to an ATM yet. So he just told me to take it.

After several much greatful hugs, we were back on the road, only stopping at In-N-Out. Except this was an awesome In-N-Out. No drive thru, completely different layout. I took pictures, don't worry.

Back to Davis and in bed at 3:30.

Today, I woke miserably at 9:30, called Brandon to find out he was in Chico. Called the Greenways, who were glad to take me.

I spent most of the day with them, actually. After meeting we went to lunch with Darren and Maria at a little quaint place in Woodland. I went with Darren and Maria after that since Daryl had to pack for DC.

I did a lot of sitting, checking mail, reading comics.

Daryl and Lois picked us all up for gospel meeting. First time in our actual one. Weird. It was nice. Walter was there to help Lily.

Falling asleep on the way home. I did a bunch of reading, but not enough. I need to go now.

I have had such an amazing weekend. So amazing in fact, I cannot tell you about it at this time. But I'll catch you up later. Odd. There were four guys in the bathroom just now, at 3:30 in the morning, all from different circumstances. Amazing.

Yep, trying to do work. Just not happening.

Got up and went to Chem discussion. Slava was not there. I watched the class size go up, then slowly go down. After about half the people had left, I decided that I should just pack up and go play some racquetball. It was 15 minutes. Respectable.

After I packed up all my stuff and was out the door, I see Slava running down the hall. In the room I go. Apparantly Slava doesn't like the mornings either.

It was good though. Except she felt bad about being late, so we were there until the hour, also known as when the next classes start. Meaning I was a bit late to racquetball. Whoop-de-doo.

As I got there, they were just finishing up the lesson of the day, of which Eric apparantly demonstrated poorly. So I was putting on my gear and he motions for me to go to court one.

In court one was himself and two other guys, one of which is probably the best in the class. The other was just a ringer, a friend of Eric's. We played doubles.

I was obviously the least skilled player there, but it didn't seem to bother anyone. Man, they're all powerful hitters. It's intense. But it was really good for me. I need to start practicing more. And more and more and more.

I felt pretty good after that, so I rode back to the dorms wearing my shorts. It was cold.

Hum, I did some stuff. Lazy lazy. I opened my math book, answer guide, notebook, and notepad, yet haven't really done much with that. It's all due tomorrow at 1, so I have time.

I did my laundry. Yep. Oh, darks are probably done.

I got a haircut. That's what I was forgetting. University Haircutters. Marshall cut my hair this time. He cut it a bit too short, so it makes me laugh when I look in the mirror. But it feels wonderful. I love feeling my head.

Blah blah blah. I think I'm going to try and get to bed early tonight. Probably after I finish writing this and take out my laundry. But I have to read all of Matthew by Monday. Doable, but it may be tough. Well, I'd best be getting on it.

I've been having a great day and I don't know why.

I got up too early and went to Chem. No lecture notes today. Slight mishap. Emphasis on the Shap.

I wore my scarf for the first time. It is warm. A little scratchy if you move it around too much, so don't.

After that, I went back to my room to waste the hours away on the computer. I ate lunch with my hot date, the California Aggie. Oh, the times we had.

At the designated time, I packed up my stuff... all my stuff... and went to math.

Still having a great day, I think I annoyed every person in the lecture hall. "Ooh boy, integrals!" The fun I had.

Then I biked with all my stuff all the way over to the music building. Scott wasn't there, so Paul ran rehearsal. For some reason, when the instructor isn't there, it's always much more fun. We continued the ongoing joke of Nick's quote, "It's not that hard... I'm just a retard." We're playing some pretty awesome music. The Irish guards seem to know how to pick 'em.

Then I quick hopped over to Everson for New Testament. We mainly went over the paper topics, so I only took a page and a half of notes... with my LAPTOP!

Then I did some stuff. I ate dinner with Patrick. We discussed the possibility of going to San Fransisco this weekend. Luckily, he's going there already. So it works out great. Friday we'll go see his brother's art show, then Saturday we'll go see Olde English. Great great.

I bought the tickets. Total came to $47.30 for two $20 tickets. Apparantly paper costs $7.30. Man. Inflation is terrible.

I went to meeting. Brandon had Kara and we couldn't get ahold of Riddy, so I sat on Kara's lap in Brandon's little car. Not meant for three people is that car.

Meeting was good. Two workers. One was Wayne that I met at Milltown. The other was older and just got back from overseas. Don't remember his name. Was very good.

Afterwards, Riddy and Allen took me back. As I came out of the elevator, I encountered nearly all of the ladies on our floor dressed skankily and wearing too much eye makeup. They were off to see a darling children's show entitled, "Men of Exotica." Sounds like fun.

Now I am here, wasting away my life. I must get to my homework before Friday. Tomorrow, I promise.

Today was awesome. No really. It was.

I woke up and got dressed for racquetball. Then I got dressed again, but this time with regular clothes.

Instead of my usual Nature Valley granola bar, I tried a PowerBar for breakfast. It was actually really good. Better than the Balance Bars. But they're smaller, so I think two would be better for breakfast.

Anyway, I got on my bike and headed over to the ARC. Today was focused on serves, learning the three basic serves: the lob, drive, and z-serves. I paired up with Sterling who isn't quite as good, but mainly because he needs to return the ball. So we did some returning.

Immediately afterwards, I slowly biked over to the music building for improv. New girl in class. We worked on resolving lines and the likes. Fun stuff. Getting deeper.

Then I ate lunch with Sarah and Jarrett. Wasn't all that bad. Some chicken nuggets, lasagna, and pizza bagels.

I did a lot of nonsense, but I finished the book of Mark for my New Testament class.

I then ate dinner with Doug. Rather quiet conversation though. I've become rather fond of unsweetened iced tea. The sweet stuff is pretty gross. I love the bitterness. So weird.

Well, I did my prelab in the hour before the lab. Not that hard, mostly busywork. Then I left for the lab.

I have to say, that was the most fun chem lab I have ever had. Mainly because I tend to not care about labs, and our TA doesn't either. She even admitted to us that she works mainly in theory, so the practical application doesn't matter to her. How awesome. Because I'm so loud, I actually managed to convince her to let us cheat on the lab. Instead of doing each part three times, we could do it once and copy each other's for the other two. Oh, Slava. How awesome is that. I think this will be even more fun than last term because my partner actually cares and will to all the busywork. Oh, it made me oh so happy.

Since then, I've been happy. Happy happy. Time to do stuff!

Well, today was boring. All I'll say is that I ate a PowerBar (it was delicious), put out the rug (it's fuzzy), and went climbing (it made me sore).

As for the weekend, let us recap.

Friday around 4, Riddy picked me up. We went to In-N-Out for lunchy dinner, then drove the drive to Alec's house. That night was a little awkward, since most of the people there were people I recognized yet weren't familiar with. But as the night progressed, more people came and things were better.

Among the more memorable people were Brianna Leen, Kara Hwang, and Jamie Bone. They're just fun to see.

After that, Brandon, Riddy and I crashed at Riddy's place. It was kind of fun just the three of us, actually sleeping under the same roof at once. The night fell.

We woke up at 8, or rather 8:15. Whatever it was, we got on the road after a quick stop at McDonald's for breakfast. Perhaps the only edible meal they serve.

Anyway, 2 blocks away from Alec's house is a rather large field. This held the games.

Well, football is boring. And it was freezing out there. So in the several hours we were there, I went to lunch 3 times. First it was for coffee, then actual lunch, then just for the company and warm heat of the car. But it was much better than freezing out in the cold, watching something I don't even enjoy.

Well, more people showed up to the game. Probably most importantly was Jayna, who aside from being awesome is my sister. She came bearing gifts as well, so she was kind of like a Santa Claus, except skinnier, female, half Asian, less facial hair, and pretty much anything else you can think of besides the gift bearing part. But it was cool.

Other notable people included Robbie Veldkamp, Bill Trammel, Amy Robinson, and Winston Churchill Walker.

After the games, the winners felt proud and all the players felt dirty. The few of us clamoured back to Riddy's place where showers and male grooming took place, then eventually we went back up there to Ron Wood's.

There were way too many people there. It was disgusting. Almost hard to breathe. But there was good food. Taco salad, with real steak and chicken. Amazing.

Eventually people started moving, so I claimed the piano bench. As I started playing, Mr. Forrest Jinks asked to put the damper pedal on because I was playing too loud. The damper didn't work, so he asked if I could play quieter. Fine, except with the 200 people there, all talking away, even I couldn't hear the piano, let alone the people across the room that were trying to listen (and there were some... they told me). So I got bored of playing quiet songs so I just stopped.

After a while, Riddy and I decided to bring out our trumpets (yes, we brought them). Upon seeing these, Mr. Jinks requested that we put in mutes. Apparently all that matters to Forrie is Forrie. Anyway, we had a fun time playing some duets from the hymn book. It was really weird though. The moment we started playing, the entire room fell silent. Completely silent, all hundred something people. Fun. Kara came and mentioned that Brandon was waiting, so we skedaddled out to the car and drove back.

Brandon wanted to drive back to Davis, so I hopped in with him, in hopes of getting the stuff Jayna brought somewhat closer to Davis. It was fun though. I got to stay the night at Brandon's since it would just be easier in the morning.

In the morning, we both got ready for meeting and went to the Johnson's, as usual. Since it was so far out of the way, there weren't any extras, but it was still good. Miranda spoke out of Nahum 1:7 which gave me a little chuckle, since it's an In-N-Out verse. Is that the Double Double?

Following Riddy and Allen, Brandon and I went to the gas station to fill up. Way up north, lunch was being served, but we finally decided that we should just stay down here since gospel meeting is here anyway and it would be 2 hours out of our way. It was fine, except that meant no saying goodbye to Jayna. Oh well. Bye Jayna.

The four of us went to the Grad for lunch, a sly pick by Riddy since there was some important game going on and the Grad has 22 TVs or something like that. Delicious as always.

We then went to Brandon's for a while and played some games, blah blah blah. Then we went to gospel meeting.

Harold Hilton was up helping Lily, but aside from Dick, we had Kent Willisten and Lyle Schultz. About half the remaining kids from the get together were there.

After meeting, dinner was being served at Chris and Shawna's, so we made the trek back up there. It was actually very fun. I played their Steinway and ate enchiladas. After some time, Riddy and I picked up our trumpets and Allen got his sax. We experimented around for a while, but the best solution was for Riddy and I to play the written notes and for Al to play by ear. It eventually got to the point where I would read the tenor part and it sounded pretty cool. So we got up the nerve to walk outside so we wouldn't be too loud for the guests. Turns out they opened the door to hear us. It was quite a bit of fun. And apparently we didn't sound that bad.

Well, I left with Riddy and Al and we went back to Riddy's place. We were really tired, so everything we did was funny. Brandon was dropping Kara off at Dawnita and Emily's place, so he just came over when he was done. I hopped in the car and off we went for Davis. Man, we were tired.

So then I got back and the rest is boring. Now I have some reading to do, and a Chem prelab to start thinking about. Bah.

Well, it has been a rather long weekend. And that would be the reason I'm falling asleep right now. Hopefully I can get a more detailed description of the past few days in tomorrow, for right now needs to be reserved for sleep. But I can say that it was one of the best (if not simply the best) get together I have attended. Okay bye!

So it's a three day weekend and a big get together. So there will potentially be no posting for a few days. Hang in there.

To sum up today:
Chem was a lecture.
I ate lunch.
Math was odd... I sat in a different seat.
New Testament was fun since I used my laptop today. It was wonderful.

Riddy is waiting.

Exactly.

What an odd day it has been.

I woke up at 7:30 to the sound of my alarm. I think it proves that I need more sleep when I recall the thought process as I heard that familiar sound.

Beep.
Somebody shut that stupid thing off.
Beep.
That can't possibly be my alarm. It's way too early.
Beep.
Although, I do have an early class...
Beep.
Shoot... I have to get up.

So that wasn't all that great. But there was a huge overconfidence in my mind that the sound of my alarm wasn't telling me to get up.

Chem discussion was stupid. Slava, despite her amazing ability to speak English coherently, is a pretty bad TA. If you don't answer a question correctly, you are stupid. And if you don't have a question, she takes extreme offence. So the only way to make her happy is to ask questions you already know the answer to. Silly Slava. Tricks are for your mom.

So since we only had a limited supply of questions, we got out 20 minutes early, much to Slava's dismay. That meant I could go to racquetball early. I got to warm up with Nathan. Nice guy. Today we were working on the rules of racquetball, so anybody who knew how to play already paired up and went to work. So I went with Matt. He seemed a bit older, but we paired well. I tuckered out halfway through though. It was pretty pathetic. I need to work on my endurance.

After our game, our TA came by and we played a little Cutthroat, just three man racquetball. It was pretty fun. I was pretty exhausted after that. So I went home to a quick nappy on my bed.

It ended up being only about 15 minutes, since Tony came in and I needed to eat, but it's cool. I did some stuff. Math, eating, blah. I did a little rock climbing too. Not bad.

Time for math discussion. Aside from the huge lecture hall, this was the first actual classroom in the Death Star that I had to find. So I walked into one of the parts of a building and the numbers were roughly 1000 numbers too high. So intuitively, I went downward. Lucky for me, as soon as I walked down the cement stairs, I found a sign on the side of a building that said "70, 80, 90" meaning I had found my room. Unfortunately, the class wasn't as great as that feeling.

Of the three questions asked, Robin was able to answer one. The other two were left hanging. I'm not even sure he bothered with one of them. I think I might not be going to that class... I'll just ask our beloved Dr. Grishin. Perhaps I will email him.

Since then, I've been hanging around. I talked to Riddy and Brandon, since our plan was to go play some racquetball tonight. Brandon had an IM game, so Riddy and I went out to dinner before that. We got a court at 9, but it turned out that's when Brandon's game was. So Rids and I found our court empty and played at 8:30. Nine rolled around and we became Brandon's team's cheering squad. They completely demolished their opponent, tripling their score.

On a completely awesome side note, I now have a different middle name. My middle name is "the littlest leprechaun." This came about when I was talking to Elliot at the rock wall and he asked for my card. Apparantly he's been changing all the people he knows' middle names. Swipe in the ID, change the middle name field. That's the only field they leave open. So now apparantly whenever I swipe my card, my middle name is the littlest leprechaun. I'll have to see if it holds true outside the ARC. And the name isn't just some flaming invention. It's actually a climb on the wall.

So after that was done, Riddy, Brandon, and I discussed the process tomorrow. We finally came to a conclusion. I forget what it was though.

Now I'm here. I have a day of sweat on me and I feel dirty. Bye.

Yep.

Chem lecture at 8. Claire passed me a note then got mad because I didn't respond. Passing notes is naughty. I had to sit next to Stupid Questions Girl though. Perhaps a little background.

Stupid Questions Girl is a girl from my Chem 2A lecture that came to be known as such when she started asking stupid questions. Huh, imagine that. You may say there's no such thing as a stupid question, but you obviously have not met her. She will ask things completely unneccessary or just plain stupid that waste lecture time. And adding to her frequent questions is the fact that she has an immense spitty lisp that sounds as if she's a snake with yogurt in her mouth.

So Stupid Questions Girl asked me if I was able to get the notes from the 5th and the 7th online. Feeling dirty that she was not only in my close proximity, but actually directing her stupid questions to me, I responded with something like, "I can't remember." Relieved that she was no longer talking to me, I reminisced how the 5th consisted solely of the syllabus, which was handed to us, and a welcome page. The 7th was in powerpoint form, so not able to be opened using Acrobat. Ahh, Stupid Questions Girl. I hate her.

I went and took a nappy in my hammock listening to The Bad Plus. As a result, I have had "Cheney Pinata" stuck in my head all day, including this very moment. Es cool though. I did eat lunch at the DC. Aztec Chicken. Yum.

As it was my first Triple Wednesday, a term I just made up, I got my trumpet and notebooks and biked my way over to Veimeyer.

Math was pretty much like all other lectures. I have come to appreciate the Russian accent, especially the way he pronounces "email." So awesome.

It turns out there's another Stupid Questions Girl in that class, but she's a lot cuter and can enunciate words clearly, so it's okay. But she was sitting by Second Year Who Thinks That Means She Knows So Much More Than You Girl, and they conversed. I've overheard her before. She gets on my nerves almost as much as Stupid Questions Girl (the ugly, lisping one). We've all lived in the dorms for a quarter, we know how things go. Just because you did last year doesn't mean you know more about them. So just shut up and ask yourself why you're surrounded by freshmans. Because you're not smarter than them, that's right.

After class, I picked up my trumpet and stuff and headed over to Music 203. New room, same people (mostly). All right, I lied about that part. We've nearly halved due to scheduling conflicts, but hopefully that can be sorted out. We got some new music, most of which I was screwing up and we had to start over, but it's cool. I openly admitted my wrongness.

After that was done, I grabbed my stuff and hurried over to Everson for New Testament. We finished up Judaism and were hoping to start on the gospels, but didn't quite make it. After class I asked Dr. Hurst if I could use my laptop to take notes, and he said that was fine. Awesome.

Since then, I've been doing a bunch of nothing. I did some more math problems. Oh, Katie and Hilary came back and visited us. They lived on our floor last quarter, but moved back home. So Shani, Doug and I went to Starbucks with them. I got a Peppermint White Mocha. It wasn't bad.

Since I had that and we spent an hour talking, I didn't really have time for dinner and felt sufficient too. I regret that now.

They then went to check out my hammock, but ended up staying in my room forever. So I just got ready for meeting with them all there. At 7, I just said, "Well, I'm out. See you guys later." And that was that.

Met Brandon in the lot. We went to meeting. It was smaller than normal, but not by much. A few people were missing, that's all. Afterwards, Brandon wanted to go play racquetball, but Riddy had a house meeting, so we postponed it until tomorrow night. Oh well.

We hung out by the piano.

Speaking of pianos, once I got back, I went over to the Thompson music room and played their piano. There was a trumpet player practicing in there, so I talked to him for a while. He lives in Alder. I gave him my cell number and email to play some duets sometime. Awesome. I love the baby grand sound. It's so full and loud.

On my way back up, I stopped by Claire's room to appologize for not writing her a note. It ended up being a gathering of people, talking about whatnot. One guy, Joe, who disgustingly reminds me of Matt Eldrige, with flaming red hair and all, was in a hissy fit since he has to learn how to smoke a cigarette for a play. They gave him an herbal one to practice with. It smells like syrup. He's rather annoying. I would have to say that he must be related to Matt somehow. Perhaps a glimpse in the future. What is it with redheads? Why are they such pansies? Pushovers. Total retards.

Now I am back here, tired. I have a discussion at 8 tomorrow, the racquetball. I think a nap will be in order. But as for now, real hard core sleep.

It was a better than average day, I would say.

Oh, the morning. Now I remember.

I woke up and rolled out of bed. I was wearing basketball shorts, so I pulled on my warmups, shoes, jacket, windbreaker, gloves, and beanie. After getting ready for the day, I took my trumpet and racquetball stuff to the ARC.

So the setup of the racquetball class. We play a little until everybody is there, then we stretch and go over one basic idea for the day. Today was grip. Then we broke off into pairs and worked on that for the rest of class.

I really need to play more. I was doing stupid things I know I shouldn't have done. But oh well. That's what the class is for.

As soon as it was done, I put on the rest of my clothes, over my hot, sweaty self, then hobbled to my bike then to the music building, entirely across campus.

That was pretty difficult. But Improv was pretty good. I was going to request to Mike that we work on chord changes a little more, but before I got the chance, he started talking about just that. It was pretty cool. Class is a lot smaller this time, only about 5 students. One new guy; his name is Jeff. Guitarist.

I then ate lunch. It wasn't bad. Enchiladas. I ate with Jared. We flirted with Betty.

I opened my Chem book and read two sections. I started getting bored, so I closed it. That was my studying for the day.

I cleaned the place up a bit. Did some more reading. We need Mark 1-16 read by a week from tomorrow. The hammock is serving me well, Shane.

I was excited about going to Chem lab. It's in the new building, so everything is brand new. But first I ate dinner.

For Dad:
It was a Holland theme tonight. I'm enjoying these themes. They're turning out higher quality than the regular Sodexho food. First off, we had a split pea soup as well as a beef in vegetable stew sort of thing. It wasn't bad. They served cabbage atop that. They also had a potato half with cheese and herbs. Another one of the items was pancakes with either apples or bacon cooked inside. The pancakes were actually delicious. It was served with a thick apple-like syrup. There was also a cucumber and pickled herring, yogurt something salad. At the main stage they were serving mussels in a white wine sauce. Overall, pretty good.

I biked to the chem lab with Jared. It was pretty cool, since the lab lasted only 40 minutes. We took roll, read over the safety procedures, checked our equipment, signed up for lockers, then left.

I then went on to do nothing. Brandon was supposed to call me and we would go to the ARC, but he never did. So now I am sad. I played the piano for a while though. That was fun.

Now I'm here. And I'm still wearing my racquetball clothes. Come to think of it, I'm still wearing the sweat I produced today as well. Gross. I need to shower.

I am ashamed at how I have wasted away my day.

It was hard to stay attentive in Chem today. Luckily Professor Kelly blew up some hydrogen balloons again. Just for fun, really. It's hilarious how much a chemist he is. He really likes blowing things up. When it comes to explosions, he's a little kid with an evil giggle.

When I got back, I wasted away doing things I can't even remember. I ate lunch, I know that. I remember smelling like garlic.

I went to math. Man, it was hard to stay awake. I really must get to bed early tonight.

After that, I played around until it was time to go to New Testament. I went early to see Dr. Hurst at office hours, but he wasn't there. So I was a little early. It was cool though.

I was actually awake for that class though. Odd. We went over the Romans and their influence on the New Testament, as well as what makes a Jew.

After I got back, I started transcribing my notes. I wanted to ask Dr. Hurst if he would be opposed to my use of a laptop during lecture first before whipping it out and tap tap tapping away. But he wasn't there.

I went to dinner. It was shocking how good it was. It was a Mexican theme tonight. They had real Mexican food, the kind you might find at a cheap Mexican restaurante. They had chicken with mole, menudo, burritos (with nice tortillas), carnitas, and cactus, all of which was delicious. I actually got pleasantly full from the DC.

I went to New Testament discussion. We sat around and talked about Michaelangelo's David. Fransisco wanted us to think about approaching a text.

Well, I meant to get some more work done, but I got distracted by Olde English. And then I got started on climbing the hallways. And I want to get to bed. I think I'm going to transcribe today's lecture then get ready to sleep. And I might do some reading too.

Wow. What a day this has been.

Starting from the top...

I woke up to Daryl calling me at 8:15, in response to my question last night if there were any meetings in Berkeley. Having voided the need for an answer, I tried as politely as I could, in my grumpy morning voice, to end the conversation and get back to sleep.

I woke up again at 9:15, ate a granola bar, then dressed. Grey slacks, white shirt, wool coat, light tan bow tie. Brushed, bathroomed, out the door.

Amazingly enough, I had a car here. So I managed to get to meeting without the aid of anyone else. Astounding.

Sadly, Brandon had gone home, so was not in attendance at meeting. But there were plenty of other people to fill the missing time.

After meeting, I was explaining last night to Chuck Fleck, since he sort of butted in on a conversation with Riddy. It just felt like I was digging myself into a hole. It went somewhat like this:


Me: So last night I was at Berkeley. We didn't leave until 1 o'clock.

Chuck: [blank stare]

Me: One of the girls that lives on my floor's brother was having a concert, so a dozen kids from our floor came to cheer him on.

Chuck: [blank stare]

Me: After the concert we went out for drinks.

Chuck: [an even more blank stare]

Me: At a coffee shop.

Chuck: [blank stare]

Me: Then we went up into the mountains, just the group of us.

Chuck: [yet another blank stare]

Me: To look at the view.


What an interesting character. It would have seemed appropriate if Riddy jumped in right about there and asked if I wanted him to help me dig that hole, but he didn't. Probably wanted to pretty badly though.

The sad thing is that all of it was as innocent as it could have been. Aside from maybe being up late, there was absolutely nothing wrong with the situation. We weren't even tresspassing. Not only was it all legal, but it was morally just as well. So why did I feel so awkward?

Anyway, after that little conversation, Riddy followed me to Rebecca's, where we dropped my car off then went to The Graduate for burgers. Delicious delicious burgers. One of the finest burgers I have ever tasted. It filled me up quite well. Homey sports atmosphere as well.

After that, we went back to Riddy's place and ping ponged it up, doing lazy college kid stuff. And when I say that, I don't mean drinking or smoking weed, so I should change that to lazy elementary school stuff. Like reading comics or chatting.

Soon enough, it was time to go to gospel meeting. We arrived a nice 15 minutes early. Harold went to help his mother, so it was Dick and Kent Willisten. Both of which spoke about Jesus' birth. I really enjoyed Kent's style of speaking. It just seemed so clear and concise.

Afterwards, we hooked up with the Riddyfolks for dinner afterwards. We went to Chili's. Now still being extremely full from lunch, dinner seemed disgusting. But we had plenty of bottomless chips and I must have drank 4 glasses of water, then came the food. Barf. I had the pita fajita. It was pleasant, if you ignore the fact that I could barely eat it. But I finished it. And as it came time to pay, the Riddyfolks picked up the check. So I reached for my wallet because inside is a note that says, "Say Thanks!"

Riddy and I then went to his place to play some more ping pong and digest. Darren and Allen were supposed to come over, but Darren probably took a few hours saying goodbye to Dawnita and Allen cancelled. Riddy and I changed our voice messaged. You should all be very thankful.

Riddy then took me back to my place, where I found Patrick playing the guitar in the lounge. I joined him and we played a little bit.

Now I am back and feeling a little less full. But not much. I'm doing my laundry. Fun. I ought to pretend to do some work now.

As it is now past 2:30 and I am just now back in Davis, I will try and keep this short.

Woke up, blah blah blah. Ate lunch.

Becca's brother was having a concert, so she was trying to get as many people to go to Berkeley and cheer him on. Eventually I was convinced to go. The deciding factor was that I would be back here in time for meeting. Everyone else was staying at Mayaan's and going to her church on Sunday.

So it turns out I took my car, so Doug, Shani, and David could come back too. Fun fun.

I realized why I don't drive in the Bay Area. Traffic is not that enjoyable. It makes you late.

We ate dinner at Mayaan's in Melbrae, and it was very delicious. Orange chicken, rice, green beans, tomatos and pine nuts, pitas and hummus. Yummus. After that, we fled back to Berkeley.

The concert, in Epic Arts Studios, turned out to be a converted home. Apartment, really. There were way too many people there. The Fire Marshall would have some fun.

One thing about Berkeley is the abundance of dirty hippies. There were a lot of them at the concert. Maybe 60+ people were there. There were a lot. And they would be dirtily grooving to the music or talking disrespectfully, as parents. Bah. Dirty hippies. Flaming liberals. I've never felt so conservative in my life.

The music was great though. I think I'll buy his CD when it comes out.

Anyway, after the concert was over, we headed over to a coffee shop to get some drinks. We got there at 11:45. I got a large Oregon Chai.

There were 13 of us from Davis, plus some Cal friends as well. After the coffee shop, we headed to some museum at the top of a hill with a beautiful view of Berkeley. It was cold and wet, yet the bay looked nice.

We drove back, now the four of us are here. It was a lot quicker coming back than going there.

I might add that I finally found a use for those leather gloves. They were mighty fine in the weather. They're actually too nice to use for everyday Davis weather, since I'm afraid I will ruin them. But for dressy casual cold stuff... perfect.

Also, I parked the car here, since TAPS doesn't work weekends, and I'll drive to meeting since Brandon isn't here. Then I can get a ride from Rids afterwards, since we'll probably hang out anyway. It works out. Perfectly, in fact. Except for the fact that I'm falling asleep as I type this. Must shower now. I'm feeling dirty. Like a hippie, sort of.

It's amazing how exhausted I am. It was actually a full day of school, work and all.

All of my classes are finding their respective grooves, starting with Chem. We worked on thermodynamics, which we thoroughly covered in Physics, so it was all review to me. Interesting. Not that bad.

In my several hour break afterwards, I managed to keep myself occupied with the help of the internet. I also ate at In-N-Out with Rids and amazingly enough, did my math homework. Weird.

By the time I finished the assignment (which, I might add, is due NEXT Friday), it was time for lecture. So I got my stuff and fought the wind to Veimeyer.

Professor Grishin really isn't that bad. Aside from his use of the word "okay" literally at the end of every sentence (unless it's a question), the man is bearable. Speaking of bears, he reminds me of a teddy bear.

New Testament lecture was a little more interesting. It turns out Negin is in the class too, along with Tyson. The things I never knew.

I have a feeling from the first lecture that that class will be a bit of a challenge. It's such a quick pace that if you miss one sentence, you'll struggle to catch up. Even writing things down can be difficult since you'll miss the next sentence.

We learned about the history before the New Testament Period. We got through the Jews and the Greeks, and next Monday we'll begin the Romans. Professor Hurst is the only person I know that actually refrains from dating things with BC and AD. He'll give us dates like 1850 BCE. Oh, the striving to be politically correct. Odd, since it's a religious class based on the teachings of Christ.

Since then, I played my trumpet a bit, then went rock climbing with Sarah and Jared. After butchering my hands, I ate dinner.

Upon returning from the DC, I attempted to make plans with Riddy to go wherever for bowling, since Darren called to invite me. But alas, my ride was in Placerville. So sad.

Negin invited me over to watch Ali G with some others, so I did that. Funny, as always. She lives in Thompson, motto: "Everything about us is better than you." And it's true. I snuck to their lounge to find their "Music Room" which contained a baby grand piano. I will be over there a bit now. It is nice.

I got back to my floor around midnight to find a horde of drunken college students. Pitifully drunk. Awkward socially drunk. I escaped to my room, and here I am now. I need a shower.

Today was filled with dreams of spending my time wisely. Sadly, they were only dreams.

Excitedly, I woke at 8:15 to prepare for my racquetball class. Last night before bed, I checked the waitlist and saw I moved from #2 to actually enrolled in the class. Amazing. Now what will I check when I'm bored? Nobody sends me email.

I went to the ARC. How odd... getting units for playing. Well, I guess that's like my music classes, so I should just shut up.

I got there early. A little over 10 mintues early. I was the first one there. Most people didn't show up until 5 after, or more appropriately, the time we left.

The class seems pretty fun. The instructor, Elaine Jones, is also the women's lacrosse instructor. She's oddly normal and funny for a PE teacher. She would crack jokes, yet due to the 9:00 class time, nobody noticed.

I should mention that I'm supposed to have a Chem discussion at 8, but since it's the first week, they were all cancelled.

After the class of maybe 20 people departed, I was a little lost, so I stayed for a few minutes listening to the questions. It turns out we have a TA, who it seems plays more racquetball than our instructor. Riddy was waitlisted, but thought there was no chance of getting on, so dropped it. That made me sad.

Well, I had nothing to do for the rest of the day, since my math discussion at 4 was cancelled as well. So I sat around, planning the productive things to do, none of which got done.

The list included, but was not limited to:

Playing racquetball with Brandon.

Go bowling with Brandon and Riddy.

Go rock climbing.

Enjoy the DC food.

Read a chapter from my book.

Nap in the hammock.

Play the Thompson piano.

Ahh, such dreams. I read a portion of a chapter in my book with sleepy eyes in the hammock. I played the piano downstairs for Mayaan. I talked to Shani for a while, while falling asleep by her fridge. I ate the DC food.

I spent most of the night hours with Patrick. He starts his job as DJ for KDVS tonight from 2-4. Tomorrow, rather. So he's been fretting about the songs he's going to play, how to introduce them and such. I was sitting in the spare seat, nearly falling asleep.

We ate dinner, it wasn't all that great. When we got back, we played some duets, me on trumpet, him on banjo. Oh, the times. He got mad at his computer.

In other news, The LA Times evicted Garfield from their comics. What a glorious day.

Check it out.

It's amazing that a place designed to be funny can be filled with something so completely unfunny. Whatever.

It went well. A little long, but manageable.

I woke up to the soothing sounds of my alarm's beeping at a beautiful 8:15. Having dressed and whatnot, I headed to Chem 194 15 minutes early to ensure a good seat. Front and center, a place I'm well used to, especially in that building.

We mostly went over the syllabus, policy, and the usual first day activities. No actual learning. To make the day interesting, however, he decided to give a demonstration.

As a requirement of Chemistry professors, Professor Kelly likes to blow things up. He has that devilish grin and laugh when it comes to explosives. Because of this nature, it was a moderately poor idea for me to sit in the front row.

He had three balloons filled with various gasses. The first was filled with a mixture of hydrogen and oxygen. He proceeded to stick a match underneath the balloon.

I might mention that beforehand he anounced that if there are any students who can't handle loud noises to move to the back of the classroom or leave. Come to think of it, he probably should have included those with motion sickness or the pregnant. I'm sure that's a law, at least here in California.

Anyway, the balloon exploded. It wasn't so much an explosion as it was an atomic blast. Sure, it didn't blow up anything, but it probably should have. It sent a pulse throughout the giant lecture hall. I could feel my chest go in then out. The chalk on the board rippled off the board, leaving a cloud for quite a while afterwards. Not to mention, it was louder than when some guys launched a water balloon at the door in the study lounge while I was inside.

Then he lit the balloon containing pure oxygen. It broke.

Then he lit the balloon containing pur hydrogen. A big ball of fire took its place. Impressive, but not something I could feel in my chest.

I had a few hours break after that. It was nice, but bad at the same time, since I knew it meant I would be done later too. So I sat in my adjusted hammock and read about America. I came close to falling asleep. That thing has the potential for some great naps. Not ideal for studying.

Lunch nearly made me vomit. Luckily, I had my trusty copy of The California Aggie, so I could hold it in. Actually, it wasn't that bad. Not as bad as yesterday, at least.

Math was pretty interesting. And by interesting, I mean not at all.

Professor Denis Grishin has a thick Russian accent and looks like he belongs in a cartoon. He has an oddly shaped head with buzzed red hair. His glasses were larger than post-it notes, although roughly that shape. They sat low on his face, so his eyes appeared only in the top quarter of the lenses. He would push them up with the back of his hand.

He wore grey dress slacks, no belt, that sat well above his belly button. That is, unless he has an abnormally high navel. His shirt was green and flannel, perfectly complementing nothing else he was wearing. And he wore Vans.

Aside from his dress, mannerisms, and pretty much everything about him, he's a relatively normal guy. He stutters in his speech and you can tell he's not very social. Although, I can picture him chillin' with his home dogs. Bein' cool, you know. Listenin' to "hip" music and groovin' to the tunes.

Actually, the man is a genius. He may have a modest approach to teaching the class, but he understands the material. Unlike the other classes, he actually started lecturing. And when one person had a question, he very effectively answered it, so much that I mentally applauded him for his explanation. It may or may not be a great class.

Afterwards, I went back to my room to play a little trumpet. As of next week, that time would be spent in Trumpet Ensemble, so I thought I'd get used to the idea. Realistically, Tony was out of the room and I was bored.

My New Testament class is one I am very anxious about. I got there plenty early, over twenty minutes. I got to observe all the other people though. I guess it didn't strike me that it actually is a class on the Bible and the type of people that class would attract, but I was a little surprised when I overheard some of the conversations. It seemed that most of the people there were SuperChristians, the kind of people that play guitar and go to youth group. I overheard someone ask another if they went to bible study last week. It was odd that it seemed everyone there was comfortable except for me.

Finally, Professor Hurst came in. The way he introduced the class made me rather excited. It will be interesting, there's no doubt. One of the first things he said was that we all come from different backgrounds when concerning the New Testament. Some people know nothing, and others think they know everything. But everyone will be surprised how much they don't know. The class is focused on the life and teachings of Jesus, but also on the works of the Apostles. He says we'll learn about the time back then in order to learn why they wrote what they wrote. Not surprisingly, he asked everyone to put his/her own theological beliefs away in order to learn from an objective view.

All content aside, he is a great lecturer. He cracks jokes, even biblical ones, making me laugh then realize how stupid it is to be laughing, not unlike music jokes. He keeps the class' attention well.

After class, I went back to my room and ate some trail mix. I need more things to eat. The balance bars are running low, and the granola is only edible in the morning when I'll eat anything (that's how the oatmeal squares got down... but don't even think of sending those). I went to the piano and played for quite a bit, when Patrick came in. Being done, I went with him to his room, where he proceeded to show me the banjo he got for Christmakah. Surprisingly (no, not at all), even though he's had it a week or so, he was rather proficient. I told him that we should start a band and play modern rock. I think I've been listening to too much They Might Be Giants. Silly ideas keep coming into my head.

Nearly going to dinner, Patrick decided to come along, then eventually the rest of the floor. This is the reason I don't usually eat with other people. It takes too long. I was intending on getting down there at 6, but the elevator only started moving at 6:39. So I hopped out and opted to get ready for meeting instead. Which means I am now ravening. Oh, I'll hold up.

Brandon came and picked me up right at 7. I gave him his present, The Metrosexual's Guide to Style, to which before opening said, "I'll bet it's something metrosexual." Good guess, Brandon. Way to ruin the surprise.

Meeting was very helpful, and despite being down a family, very long. It was nice to have a study that wasn't solely a chapter or two. The one thing that stuck out to me, for whatever reason, was that Lauren mentioned how the study was "Choices and Responsibility" not "Choices and Consequences." Probably since I was just looking at the study list and noticing that most of the other studies are opposites. Whatever. It was nice.

Brandon and I stayed afterwards quite a bit, chatting with the Greenways. Brandon stayed because he knew I had a present for them, but didn't realize that it was in his car, the keys to which were in his pocket the entire time. So we got a nice chat with Daryl and Lois. And they enjoyed their olives and oil.

When I got back to the dorms, everybody was getting ready for a night at the Grad. Apparantly there is a party or something of that sort going on there tonight. I should have asked Brandon if he wanted to go. Meh, I'm too hungry for that. I need to rest up. And that hammock is right here...

I'm feeling very jittery right now.

I woke up at 8, but remembered that tomorrow I start school, so I slept until 11. I finally got out of bed and dressed.

With nothing to do, I helped Becca put her TV in her mom's car. Apparantly she thought I was a nice young man.

I ate lunch at the DC. I never thought the DC had particularly bad food until I got used to my dad's cooking again. It's a weird feeling when you know you're not hungry and need to eat, yet cannot physically eat any more food since it would come back up anyway.

I almost went to the bookstore, but I decided to put up the hammock instead. And what a glorious hammock it is.

I checked my mail to discover my climbing shoes had arrived. I raced back up to my room and suffocated my feet with them. Ah, the glorious pain of climbing shoes. With the shoes came a marvelous page of stickers, with which my bike will continue to be decorated.

In need of notebooks for tomorrow, I finally went to the bookstore, took out the remaining 100 original dollars from the Wells Fargo account, then proceded to buy less than $5 worth of notebooks.

Almost immediately upon my arrival back at the dorms, I met Doug, who proceded to ask if I would like to join him to get his textbooks from the bookstore. With nothing else to do, I joined him.

We got half of his books, since he forgot the English class he's taking. We made a date for racquetball.

Not that much later, we were hanging out in Becca's room. Eventually we went to dinner. Equally as repulsive as lunch.

One of the things discussed in the course of conversation was the movie "The Life of David Gale," starring Kevin Spacey. So sometime in the course of events, Becca rented it.

Back in my room, everybody was very impressed and extremely jealous of my hammock. There was unneccesary anger, including phrases along the lines of, "I hate you." It seems silly to me, since each and every one of them is completely capable of getting their own hammock.

Sometime later, Doug and I went to the rock wall. It was so great to be there again. My arms felt so terrible though. It got to the point where they felt like they were just going to fall off. Amazingly enough, that's a good feeling. It was great getting to finally use my new stuff. The shoes were killing my feet and the chalk bag was filled with UC Davis chalk. I completed the new tan-on-white V1. Old blisters are peeling.

About to crumple over, I went to Becca's room, to notice they were just about to start the movie. So I joined the two of them. It's a very interesting movie. I liked it, but hated it as well. I recommend it if you're in need of a movie to watch. It's a little creepy though.

Now I must shower and get ready for bed, as school starts tomorrow. Goodnight folks, I'm out.

Over the break, the biggest surprise for me was to learn that people actually read this. That means that I now am obligated to make this interesting and enjoyable to read.

On that note, I would like to appologize to all those faithful readers who stopped reading when finals week came and I did nothing for a week straight. Well, you can start reading again. Or not, whatever you want.

My day has been rather uneventful. Unless you count the event of transporting myself from Santa Barbara to Davis noteworthy. Oh, I guess it was. Road trips in the Olds are always fun.

We had four passengers this time, all of which, according to some odd error, packed as if there were only two travelling. This was not my fault. As the owner of the car, I made sure to alert each passenger on the status of the trip, including how much space was to be occupied by other beings. This didn't seem to take any firm hold in the brains of the passengers, as we carried two projectors, a toolbox, and a dartboard.

From our past experiences, we learned to fill the tank before the empty light turned on. Sadly, as the empty light is always on, we were constantly filling the tank.

The one major problem that previously went unnoticed was the windshield wipers. Since it was raining, we had to turn them on. They haven't been used much, so they've turned from "winshield wipers" to "windshield smearers." It's actually almost easier to see out of the front winshield if you don't turn on the wipers. Somehow we managed to get by though.

After reaching Davis and politely refusing to help David, Nick, and Brett carry their things to their rooms, I drove over to Rebecca's. She offered me leftover dinner and an apple, which I so kindly thanked her for prior to devouring. I then took my bags and put them in her car.

I must have got a lot of things this break, since my bag would definitely not be allowed on any major airline flight, domestic or international.

It felt so nice to be back walking though the impersonal, hotel-like halls. An odd sort of home. A nice relieved feeling. I think it felt better coming back here than it did walking in my room in Santa Barbara. Probably because nobody touched anything here. My bed didn't split in two and rearrange around the room, which made me very happy. I mean, a twin bed isn't that big to begin with. There was no female clothing in my closet. My dresser did no get uglier and replace everything inside with ugly clothes. My books were not touched. My 5.1 surround sound system was not moved to an inappropriate asymmetrical placement, not focused on the swivel chair. All right, so I don't have a 5.1 surround sound system or a swivel chair here in Davis, but it bugged me when that happened in Santa Barbara.

Well, I played the piano and realized once again that it can't play worth my windshield wipers. It was nice to get my music fix.

Oh, and Betty served me very well for the 6+ hour car ride.

Now I must shower and ready myself for bed.