Dog Days are Over

This weekend, both Saturday and Sunday started out as really great days. Yesterday I went and saw The Wakeville Stories, a play written by my Honors Comp 1 professor and it was epically amazing. I went with Jon and his friend Rich. The play was really interesting and I loved seeing something that a professor I really admire created. However as all good things usually do, the day came to a horrible end. Sadly, certain things have gotten out of control with my roommate.

My mom had some really good insight last week that I realized applied last night. She said in April her life fell apart and I guess I never realized it until now, but mine did too. I don't think you can actually lose a parent, or a spouse, or a child, without your life falling apart. I'm not sure why I was pushing this fact away. The fact is, my life has fallen apart. But it didn't fall apart because of something I did. It just happened. There was nothing I could do to control. But I think before I can pick up the pieces, I probably need to admit that it's fallen apart. Which I finally did last night. How does this relate to my roommate situation? Well, before my dad died, I probably could have dealt with this situation, piece of cake. But right now my strength is missing. So instead of feeling like a failure, I've realized that it's ok to be weak sometimes. I have every damn right to be weak right now. So what if this hit 6 months after? The grieving process really does take a year, if not longer.

Since this realization, I can't say I feel too great. I'm feeling emotionally tired and depressed and I don't want to feel it, but I also don't exactly know how to make it go away. With that being said, at least certain parts of my life still make me happy.

Today was Make a Difference Day and my chapter participated. We ended up volunteering at an Apple Orchard and basically we picked and ate apples for 2 hours. It was ridiculously fun and easy. It was a great way for my HPA chapter to bond and I think we all left feeling like we had done something good. It's those things that make me want to become happy again. The truth is I absolutely LOVE being a CO. It makes my life better and it is the one thing in my life that I constantly look forward to. I feel like it's sort of been my therapy through this year.

Monday Afternoon:

I meant to finish up this blog yesterday, but I guess I never got around to it. It got to be a crazy afternoon.

Continuing on from the awesomness of being a CO...we're having a program on Wednesday. It's our chapter's first official program of the semester and it's going to be awesome. We're doing a screening of AVPM and selling owl cookies. The money is then going to be donated to Friends of Esther. It's pretty exciting. Yesterday I was in such a great mood to blog but right now not so much. So I'm just going to end this before my rambling gets annoying. :)

Lost Headphones and Failing a Poetry Quiz 101

Wednesday was probably the most crazy jam-packed day I've had this semester. I had class. Then I went to Student Activities to find out why I did not receive an e-mail approving the food we are selling at our A Very Potter Musical Screening next week. It turns out he forgot. Oops. Yes. Thank you. How lovely. Next I was off to the library to get an insane amount of work done. Did that happen? Ehh...sort of. You know how it is. After that I had to prep for my meeting and print everything out because I was left for the library again at 3pm and would not be returning until around 10pm. So...library. Read for Business. Go to Business. Work on group project for Business. Go to E-borad meeting. Discuss Yule Ball in April (yes we are having a Yule Ball in April). Go to actual HPA chapter meeting. Go to Meeting of the Minds. Go home? Read for women in lit group project. Pass out.

Why did I just give a recap of my day you might ask? Because somewhere between walking from class to the Student Union and returning to my lovely abode at 10:30pm Wednesday, I LOST MY HEADPHONES!


NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. They are gone. Forever. And I have thrown things around my room attempting to find them with no avail. I'm pretty sure they fell out of my bag during the Meeting of the Minds, because at that meeting I had my stuff pretty much...well...everywhere. I mean it was not pretty. So now, I have no headphones. I cannot listen to music on my way to class AND I cannot finish watching Life Unexpected while my roommate sleeps through life. GAHHHHH.

Thankfully, life will go on. That's why there is a radio shack...which I will conveniently stop by on my way back from work tonight.

One more thing before I go. Today I had a ridiculously hard Poetry Quiz. I mean like the thing was a beast. And my professor, whom by the way I think is amazing, did NOT PREPARE US AT ALL. I heard most of the class walk out saying that they all failed and I am sad to say that I am among them. stupid stupid poetry...

A Funk Mood

Usually writing is my tool to get everything out and make me feel better so I'm going to have a go at it. I'm in a funk. Like a real one. Yesterday was pretty bad but I figured everyone has their bad days right? But today, instead of waking up and feeling better and enjoying life...I'm just BLAH.

Now I understand the word Blah is not an actually feeling or emotion, but everyone seems to understand what it means. Blah is when nothing is going right and your entire body for some unknown reason is just dysfunctional. Like you don't want to move. Or even attempt to get out of bed. It's the feeling where all you want to do is lay there and be absolutely miserable. BLAH.

I'm not even sure why I'm in this funk. It's not like things are going bad. Things are actually going really good. I got a 93% on my Women in Lit test, which I thought I totally failed. My Women in Lit professor even gave us breakfast this morning which was pretty sweet (literally...he got us doughnuts) :)
Annnnd the guy I like, who seems to like me too and is just afraid to make a move, is actually attempting to make a move. Which by the way I'm finding to be extremely cute.

So why the funk? Who knows? I mean I'm pretty sure I know what started it. On Saturday night I had a very vivid dream about my dad. And I woke up and knew that it happened but I kind of tried to push it away. I try not to let that stuff take over my life because I'm very set on enjoying EVERYTHING. But then my mom and I talked and she had had the same kind of dream and then I remembered that it's been 6 months and then it kind of went from there.

I know I probably shouldn't do this, but I think I'm going to take the next 30 minutes to just relax. Maybe read a little bit, or maybe just lay in bed and listen to some music. I don't know if that will help, but I really would like to calm down before I attempt to tackle the bajillion things that I constantly have to do. I may come back to writing later, so if I post again later today, don't be surprised.

A Bit of Spare Time

So I had a few spare minutes after getting out of the shower before I have to go to our QUIDDITCH meeting and it really isn't enough time to study for French so I thought, "Why don't I write a blog post?"

And here we are. So the last week has been pretty horrible. Eli's appendix apparently burst on...Tuesday? And then the next day the bacteria started to drip down his spine. Basically he had like 3 surgeries in a row to try and clean out the bacteria. Thankfully, it finally seems to be working. But the week was pretty stressful because all I did was basically pray that he was going to be ok.

Today has been a pretty exciting day. This morning, Sarah, Nicole, and I went into a sweet shop in town to try and find something to sell the week of Halloween for Dumbledore's Army. We found something pretty amazing (which I can't talk about because it's not approved yet) and we're hoping that people will enjoy :)

Tonight, Liz, me, and a bunch of other people (hopefully) are going out. This will be the first time I've gone out all semester and I'm pretty excited. I mean, I do work tomorrow, so I can't be out too late, but it'll still be fun. I hope. It depends on who is actually going to go with us I guess.

Well I have to go run off to do more HPA stuff. I feel like it never ends sometimes...but that's ok because I absolutely love every minute of being a CO! :)

And it's been a while....

Long time, no write. As per usual, a lot has happened since I last blogged. But today I just feel like writing about what is going on right now...so here it goes.

Working at Applebee's is going well. Actually, tonight was my first shift on my own and I think that I did pretty well. Thankfully it wasn't too busy...the biggest problem was that a lot of older people came in before 5:30pm and I ended up filling two sections because of course older people can't really sit at the high tops by the bar. But it ended up working out ok. I feel bad because some of the servers didn't really get too many tables tonight but sometimes that just happens.

I'm really looking forward to everything happening past tomorrow. Well actually tomorrow Dumbledore's Army of New Paltz is being interviewed for a spotlight on the WNPC channel, so that's pretty cool. I'm just not ready for it and it's being put together extremely last minute which kind of sucks.

But the good stuff is happening after tomorrow. Thursday, I'm going into NYC for the Triple Rainbow Awesome tour. So far it's just me, Katherine, and Carolyn going from the chapter, but that's ok. I'm just really excited to be 1)taking the train (I miss them) and 2)GOING INTO THE CITY!!

I'm so excited. This will be the first time I'm going into the city without my mom and sister. I mean I'm still going with people but I'm going on my own. And I'm going to see some of my favorite rockers which just makes it 10 times better.

Then on Friday night I work, but I'm the first one in which means I'm the first one out. And actually, I'll finally get to learn what going on a wait is like, so even though I know it will be oober stressful, I'm looking forward to it. I mean after I've worked a wait, I can probably do just about anything.

Saturday I'm going to use to relax and get ahead on my projects and studying. I only work 5pm-8pm running food, so it's not that big of a deal. And again, I'm looking forward to it because I will get to learn the food, which is something I need to do eventually if I want to bar-tend/serve. It should be a good learning experience.

Sunday, Liz, Lacey, and I are going to the HPA Blowout in Somerville. Now I am really really excited for this except for one problem...I have no idea where we are going to stay the night. I have tried asking multiple people connected to the HPA for some help, but nobody seems to want to get back to me. So that should definitely be an adventure. Hopefully it turns out to be a good one. We will be coming back to campus on Monday morning, and then even though I know it's a lot of driving in a short amount of time, I think I want to go to Martin and Janet's for Monday night until Tuesday mid-afternoon because I really want to see them and I honestly don't think I can get away again until at least November or possibly even Thanksgiving. Of course if it turns out that I normally won't work on Saturdays, then I will probably go again in two weeks because otherwise I might go insane.

Well, I guess that's about all. There's more I would love to rant about but I'm kinda exhausted so I think I'm going to read some good old Harry Potter and go to sleep.

Until next time.. :)

I'm allowed to have a sad day

This morning when I turned on my computer, I did not expect to see anything that would particularly catch my eye. And I wish I hadn't. At around 3:00 this morning, a wonderful 16 year-old girl named Esther Earl, passed away. She battled cancer for the last four years.

Now it might seem odd that this has hit me so hard because it was not until June that I learned of Esther. However, when the HPA won the $250,000, I had the honor of meeting her via skype, although it was briefly. But that doesn't mean that she hasn't inspired me.

It's been almost 5 months since my father passed away from cancer. The effects of this disease are still very much in my mind and I remember distinctly every moment leading up to the death of my father. So although I never personally knew Esther, and only said hello to her once, I feel for her family. I know how hard it is to lose someone you love to this horrible disease. My family has just started to recover from it. I think that's why it is affecting me so much. It hits so close to home. But I want to use my experience to try to help Esther's family start healing. It is a long and hard process, especially when someone so young has been taken away from you.

When I called my mom this morning and told her about Esther, I told her that I wanted to go to her funeral. I realize how that might not be totally appropriate, but as a fellow nerdfighter and HPA member I want to be there. Because in the two months that I knew of Esther, I looked up to her. She was such an amazing, strong, and wonderful person.

My heart truly goes out to Esther's family and friends.

#DFTBE <3

UPDATING! HOLY CRAPNESS!

I actually find time to update. Woohoo! Know why? Because it's a Saturday night and no one is home and I have no friends. YIPPIE! ok I'm kidding. I have friends. However the majority of them are currently..hmm...3000ish miles away from me. Something like that.

So what has happened this summer? Here's a rundown.

I worked at Applebee's. It was awesome. In fact, it's not over. I still work there. :)
Melinda and I drove to Arizona to see The Remus Lupins and Skyway Flyer.
Then, like a week and a half later, I drove to Arizona to see the ROFLCOPTOUR minus Kristina and Luke. I also registered people to vote at the concert. It was cool. :)

NEXT, THE HARRY POTTER ALLIANCE WON $250,000! (more about that later)...

THEN...THE HIGHLIGHT OF THE SUMMER...INFINITUS 2010.

So here's the fantasticness of Infinitus. I got there extremely late Tuesday night, or I guess you could consider it extremely early Wednesday morning. So I had two sets of roommates. I stayed with one the first night and the other for the rest of the conference. So the first group of roommates and I had a little miscommunication. I thought they were staying at the Royal Pacific. But it turns out they were at the Portofino. So at 1 in the morning I'm walking around the Royal Pacific trying to find a room that doesn't exist there and of course I can't get a hold of my roommates because IT WAS ONE IN THE MORNING. I thought I was going to have to sleep in the lobby (which would not have been fun).

So finally I was able to wake them up (oops) and they had to come pick me up because the shuttles weren't running. I felt horrible. But thankfully they didn't seem to mind. That was the first night of no sleep because I didn't go to bed till 4am and had to get up and be out of the room by 10:30. But it turned out that I stayed till 11 and got a ride back to the Royal Pacific, where I met up with my second set of roommates.

So first off, the girls I roomed with were AWESOME. Lindsey and Agostina were the only ones at the hotel when I got there because Bri's flight had gotten delayed (sad). However, registration wasn't opening again until 1pm and it was 11am, so we ended up sitting in the lobby of the hotel for 2 hours talking and basically doing absolutely nothing. After we were able to get our registration, we went down to the water taxi and took it to Islands of Adventure, because of course the first thing everyone wants to do is go see Hogwarts. I mean seriously. YOUR RIGHT THERE. So we went to the Wizarding World, walked around in awe, then had a delicious and very filling lunch at The Three Broomsticks (you have no idea how cool that sounds). Of course we tried some Butterbeer and it was divine. Yes, divine. It was like Butterscotch something, but way way better. We wanted to keep walking around, but it started raining, so we decided to just head back to the hotel because we knew we would get to check in soon anyway. By the time we got back, Bri had arrived and so we decided to check in and kinda collapse for a while. Then Lindsey had to go to Final Battle rehearsal, so Bri, Agostina, and I went downstairs to get dinner because Brianna wasn't there yet. The food at the hotel was actually pretty good. We all kinda just took it easy that night because we were all exhausted from traveling.

Ok, that was Day 1. More to come in a few minutes. I have to log out of Google first so I can create my new YouTube channel.

:)