Up Late

Stayed up until 5 am to see Sheena R. off to the airport on her way to Salzburg. She’ll be over there all year. A long night, but well worth it. And I don’t have class until 11:30, so I’ll still get a decent ammount of sleep.

Finally, a post!

I’ve been meaning to post for quite some time now, but haven’t managed to take the time to do so yet. All in all I’ve been quite busy, what with moving in, serving on Saturday, organizing the room, meeting the new people (as well as some returners that I never met), going to classes, and actually starting on homework, and getting the tech situation all figured out.

I guess I’ll start from the top. I got here Saturday morning, and looked for somewhere to check in. No-one knew where for me to go, so I just went ahead and moved in, as I knew that I was cleared to do so, and Cean was already there, so I had access to the room. Later I went to get the key, and Tommy (the new hall director) went to see what information he had. I saw him checking e-mail, and on the phone, but I finally got my key. Apparently while Fr. Brad had gotten word from res-life that I was cleared for move-in, something wasn’t finished on their end, and the Hall Director never heard about that.

But in the end, all was good. I served the mass, and that evening, Cean and I spent the better part of two hours moving furniture, over and over, trying to determine which layout worked best. I’d brought a boockase he didn’t know about, and we have the couch that my RA Jake had last year, as he now has a futon. So the arrangement Cean had done beforehand had to be scrapped, but we eventually found a layout that really seems to work well. We have bunked beds, and the desks arranged in an L shape, under the window.


I’ve been slowly adding on to this post for the lasst few days, but in the interest of actually posting something, I think I’ll cut my chronological narritive short and just jump to the more interesting stuff.


I’d been planning to work on campus a bit this year, but I’m not too sure that’s going to happen. I applied at the front desk here in Villa, and found out today that (big surprise) I hadn’t gotten the job. I found out about the time they were conducting interviews that the way the quotas for freshmen versus returning students worked out, and how many of last year’s workers were coming back, I was somewhere around one of 18 applying for 2 positions. And I don’t have federal work study, so that was a strike against me to start with.

I got an offer to peer lead the calculus portion of the integrated Calc-Phys, and have responded with interest for that. I talked to the professor who teaches the class, (coincidentally, my Diff EQ teacher as well) and he said that they had already selected one leader, but would see if they had the need/funds for two. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that I’m out there as well.

So now I need to assess if I want to work anywhere, if so where, and see if anyone is still hiring, of if it is all done with. But off to bed, in time for my Diff EQ class. I just love math at 9:15 in the morning.

The Countdown continues

I’m down to one night. The room is beginning to look pretty bare, as I have packed up most of the stuff that I’m taking, which is a lot of the stuff that’s been on the floor for so long. I still have a bit to pack up, and will be working on it until this evening.

Once I finish writing this post, I’m packing the computer until I arrive at UP, and get a chance to set it back up and use it. Could be a day or two, but likely only until Saturday evening. Cean’s already there, and called last night to let me know that I needed to bring an ethernet cord, as they were not provided this year. Last year they were. He was also checking to see if I had any ideas on how to organize the room, or if I minded if he went ahead and worked on it. I’ll see how it worked out when I get there.


I hear dinner being started, and I’ve been on longer than I intended to, so that’s all until I get back to school.

–Nathan

Flaggers

As I was coming in to work this morning, there was a bit of road construction. Actually, it turned out to be a crew painting the crosswalks. I had come in about 45 minutes early in order to enter vegetables for my mom at the county fair, which occurs Thursday through Sunday. At any rate, they were painting the crosswalk of Rock Creek Drive, which I wanted to turn onto. The flagger had his sign turned to SLOW, so I began to make my right turn. About that time, I noticed that there was another car coming my way, in my lane. So I stopped, the flagger looked at me rather strangely for not stopping sooner, and then all of a sudden, looked at his sign, and spun it around to read STOP.

I had suspected that he might be wrong, because the closure was so short, and I could see the other end, where the other flagger’s sign was also on slow (I could see the Stop side), so I was going very slow, and hadn’t gotten too close. The flagger got on his radio, and I was cleared to pass through as soon as the other car was out of the way.


Speaking of the fair, I work all those days, as we will be very busy at the store, what with everyone in town. The Sunday of fair is one week before my move-in date, and consequently my last day at work.

Dead battery

The Following text was written at about 11:54 pm last night.

Often after work, I park my car and use the free wireless in Stevenson to surf the net. Today was one of those days. Sometimes I leave the dome light on so I can see the keys, or whatnot. Today was also one of those days.

I was on longer than I usually am, today, and have nearly (also) depleted my laptop battery. But when I went to start my car to return home, the car wouldn’t start. I had one person try and jump me, but I wasn’t able to start it. I’m not positive that I grounded the negative properly. At any rate, they didn’t have a lot of time, so I gave up. Now my mom is en route from home to come, and maybe I will be able to start it this time. I’ll have more time, and all. If all else fails, then I’ll know that it wasn’t totally my fault for getting stuck, and I’ll get a ride home. But now I’ll sign off before my laptop dies

Of course, as I wrote the last letter you see, the battery went dead, and I didn’t have enough time to post it.

As it turned out, I tried to jump the car from the van, and I placed the cable near where I did before, moved it slightly, and I saw a spark. So I left the cable in that location, and the car started right up.

If money is a curse…

“May the Lord smite me with it. And may I never recover.” –Tevye

As you may have been able to tell from the quote, I saw Fiddler on the Roof tonight. The production was put on by the local community theater, which puts on one play/musical per year.

It was a good production. I saw it at Mountain View High School this spring, and have seen the movie, but it is still worth going to see. As with any non-professional production, there were a few miscues, but it was a good show. I like Tevye’s wit, as seen above.

It was a bit hot, thhough, and one preson passed out, apparently from the heat, but it may also have had something ot do with a heart condition, based on something overheard near them. They stopped the play for about 15 minutes to deal with that, and cool the room down.

I leave you with another of Tevye’s bits of wisdom:
Villager: “An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.”
Tevye: “Very good. That way the whole world will be blind and toothless.”

I can’t believe it!

There’s only 3 weeks and 2 days until I move back into the dorm! I work the next two weeks, and then will take the last week off for packing, relaxation, and whatever stuff I planned to do over the summer that I haven’t gotten to yet.

I got my housing letter today, telling me which room and roommate I have–not that it was a surprise, as we picked that out before we left. But now all the freshmen have their roommates and are talking to each other, I suppose.

There seems to be a lot of people looking up what to do once you start college. I’ve gotten several Google hits on “dorm life” or “build your own loft” or “dorm room pictures” and things like that. I’ve thought about posting some sort of plans for my loft, and a guide for incoming freshmen, but haven’t given it a lot of time. And there are so many guides that I doubt mine would be very useful, anyway.


I finished the plant stand that I was building yesterday. I’ll take some pictures and post it in the next few days. All in all, it came out pretty much like I’d planned, except for one measuring goof which I was able to improvise on. The finished result is very sturdy, more than the one it replaces. (Which was the whole point, anyway.)


I washed the whites today–I didn’t have any clean work shirts, and I work at 3 today, so it needed done. We got a new front loading washer a month or so ago, and it spins the clothes much drier than the old (top loading) washer. In fact, I checked the clothes less than an hour after I hung them out on the line, and nearly half of them were dry. I suppose I ought to go check them again soon.

Until later,
–Nathan

I’ve been Tagged

Cel had me do this post, from her blog, which seems to have disappeared.

10 years ago today: I was nine, which was between the third and fourth grades. I don’t remember the exact day, but I was probably pretty excited to be moving up to the other half of the school. (Grades K-3 are at one end, 4-6 at the other.)

5 years ago today: Preparing to start high school. I don’t remember all that well, but I likely was doing some yard work, and some sort of craft–possibly a latch hook of some sort. Those are the main things I did over the summer. Also, quite a bit of reading.

1 year ago today: According to my calendar, which I started keeping on the palm Pilot I got for Christmas 2003, I worked from 9-6. Chances are, that was the only thing I did that day.

Yesterday: Got a haircut at 9 in the morning, worked from 5-10. Spent the better part of the day working in my room, moving stuff from one place to another, and resolving a situation where I was charged twice for my website. I have my site hosted on Honest Networks, which is a small company. They are new to the paid hosting game, and they have a few glitches now and again. But when something happens, you let them know, and by gosh, there’s someone working on it that same day. It turns out that they just made a mistake in how they set up my account in the billing program.

Tomorrow: Work around the house in the morning. Work 1-10. Not much else.
[Edited 7/30 because I had in my mind that it was Saturday when I posted this. It actaully was Friday.]

5 snacks I enjoy: M&Ms, Potato chips (Ruffles are better than Lays), Fast Break candy bars, peanuts, and Wheat Thins (some varieties).

5 bands that I know the lyrics to most of their songs: Tim McGraw, Brooks & Dunn, most country acts that were popular 3 years ago.

5 things I would do with $100,000,000: Definitely buy a house, and pay off my schooling, probably a decent car, donate some to charity, and probably set up some sort of endowment for scholarships.

5 locations I’d like to run away to: You know, I really don’t want to run anywhere, but I ‘ll try to answer the question anyway. New England, Washington DC (for a long while, but not permanently), Britain, France, and New Zealand.

5 bad habits I have: Getting flustered when too much happens at once, procrastinating, putting projects aside when I don’t want to deal with them anymore (kinda goes in with procrastination, but is for the longer term), thinking that I’m a computer genius and everyone else is an idiot, eating too many snacks while at work (hey, it’s a grocery store, alright.)

5 things I like doing: Reading, working on coding something for myself, Internet stuff (usually), and lots of other stuff. (Isn’t it sad that I can only think of two things I like to do?)

5 things I would never wear: One of those insulting type shirts (Make 7 up yours), a professional football player’s jersey, women’s clothing, a hot pink shirt (without a good reason), a pair of those multi-colored socks with sleeves for each toe.

5 TV shows I like: (can i make that like(d)?) Brat Camp, 8 Simple Rules, Jeopardy, an old game show called Distraction seen in re-runs, and Millionaire before Regis left.

5 movies I like: Somewhat hindered by the number of movies I haven’t seen, I like these ones: National Treasure, Anchorman, The Lord of the Rings series, Oceans Eleven and Twelve, to list recent ones.

5 famous people I’d like to meet: I don’t think that there are that many. We’ll say Pope Benedict,

5 biggest joys of the moment: Reading a good book (I like Tom Clancy, but I just finished his most recent one), getting comments on my blog (I’m not trying to provoke any comments here, honest!), listening to some music with a decent beat and tune, finishing a project, taking a great photo.

5 favorite toys: My computer, my camera, and not that many other things.

5 people to tag: Umm, you mean people that read my blog and haven’t already done this? Uh, I , uh, pick…you.

Update

While I have been blogging a lot in the last few days, I haven’t had a major update type post in quite a while.


I got two days off of work, so my mom and I went down to visit my Grandma for a day. We spent Tuesday night down there, which is part of why I didn’t post the last few days. We did some grocery shopping, and stopped in a consignment store where I bought two pairs of cargo shorts–I’ve never had any before, and I like the extra pockets. I discovered today that one has a small hole in the back, at the top of the pocket, but I think it can be fixed.

We also bought some new flannel to make into pajama pants. I had a pair that I wore most of the year last year, but I noticed one night at home that the seat of the pants was getting quite thin, and the next night, when I went to put them on, there was a huge split in the back. That was the end of those.


I watched Brat Camp again–as I’ve said, I like the show. Although at the rate that they are progressing, I think the show will be over before I go back to school at the end of August.

Which reminds me, I’m amazed how fast the summer seems to have gone. In exactly one month from today, I will be starting classes, having moved in the day before. I didn’t get on the move-in crew, so I don’t get to move in until the day before school starts–should be fun.


Okay, I’ve got another post to do, from Celtic.