eleanorigby22

Fun's new album is amazing! It makes me miss the Format and the possibility of seeing Nate on a semi-regular basis. Give him back to Arizona you thieving New York City! This album kind of makes me understand why The Format ended I think. A running theme in so many Format songs is a need to get away from everything and in this album, he's finally managed to do that. He's moved on and started anew, but we will miss having him as a desert rat. Now he's a city rat. Sorry for missing you last night Kali. I fell asleep while I was reading. I have statistics homework due tomorrow night and I feel clueless. No more skipping class. Dinner tonight with Tina, maybe she knows statistics? I am allowed to get help from my own tutors? Everyone check out Fun, especially I'm Not as Sad as I Used to Be, Take Your Time Coming Home and The Gambler. Oh and All the Pretty Girls which he sang last time I saw him and it was the one new song that everyone managed to sing along with.

i heart weezer

My 11:30 canceled today and my boss is not here (I need some approvals for certain things), so I've decided to use this rare open time to write in lj.

Interesting weekend. Went to a party at Steffi's house this weekend. There was lots of yummy food (I really liked those meatballs Steffi, I am now officially in love!) and the Pure Romance lady came. I won a prize and a good prize too. All for my beautiful artistic renderings of male genitalia. I won this heart massager that heats up. I gave it to my mom and it works really well. It's actually pretty cool because it's all liquidy, but then you push on this metal disc inside and some sort of chemical reaction occurs and all of the liquid inside crystall izes and heats up. I had fun playing with it last night and I was recruited to give both of my parents back rubs with it. The favor was not returned. The party was fun and I got to play Beatles Rock Band which I've been wanting to do, but ended on a strange note that I will not go into. Cassandra and I decided to leave early as I felt somewhat awkward and annoyed, so we left around midnight. We decided that we weren't really ready to go home, so we just drove around aimlessly and talked about whether sexuality was the root of all personal problems. I don't think it is, but I think Cassandra is leaning that direction. Of course, a lot of it has to do with our own experiences in that area, but I do agree that sex can really fuck you up. We decided while driving around that we should relive our high school years and go secretly smoke cigarettes in a park. So we went on a shopping spree and ended up purchasing cigarettes, handcuffs, sunglasses, shampoo and paint by number kits. This lead to smoking and running through sprinklers while handcuffed at 2am in a park. There was howling and spinning involved as well, but I won't go into the whole thing. Then we went back to my house and watched Angel with some white russians. It was a very nice night and I like the park at 2am. The sky looks very pretty when spinning around, but we should have bought the telescope and walkie talkies too. We were secret agents, Raven and Bon Appetit, out on a secret mission. What is that secret mission you ask? Why, that is secret! In my head, I have a french accent right now which for some reason reminds me of Kali. It's because she thinks in accents. I eventually took Cassandra home as she had Mass with the Bishop and his puppet Dexter in the morning. it was a dangerous ride home as I couldn't stop giggling over the Dexter puppet. I just kept thinking about a mass murdering puppet with a heart of tarnished gold. I went to bed about 6am, but woke up a few hours later feeling sickly around the edges. I spent the rest of the day watching various fashion shows and reading Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil as my tutoring was rescheduled to Tuesday.

Muse comes out this week!!!!

I just read an article in Newsweek about insomnia and now I'm freaking out. They basically described me. They said that most insomnia is psychological; it begins because of a traumatizing event (mine began after my accident), but becomes a learned behavior long after the person has gotten over the event. They said that it causes anxiety and depression eventually, as well as memory and cognitive problems (exact quote: "Memory capacity and speech control diminish" is my speech control diminishing? I forget words a lot). I feel like my anxiety has increased in the last few years and my memory is also slipping. Or maybe it was never that great to begin with, I can't remember! The truly annoying thing about an article like this is that it gets me all worked up, but gives me no solutions. Actually, at the end, all they do is list the things that don't work: drugs, going to bed early, sleeping in, having a nightcap. I sleep late when I can in an attempt to catch up on sleep, but apparently this does not really help. I went to bed at 2:30 last night and woke up at 6:30. That's 4 hours which is my usual amount of sleep. I feel like I'm on the cusp of normal amounts of sleep. If I was only getting 3 hours, I would be really worried. But the other night I was talking to Cassandra and got on the subject, and she asked if I had ever talked to a doctor about it. She seemed a little concerned. This alarmed me, no one has ever thought I should seek medical care for my lack of sleep. When we started keeping our journal, I also became a little alarmed by how many of my entries talked about not being able to sleep. It's because I write at night when I can't sleep I suppose. I wonder if I would feel different psychologically and physiologically is I slept more. I would enjoy not being anxious all the time. I say all the time and that's not really true. I'm only anxious right now because I've got a lot of stuff going on and feel under pressure. And I'm considering signing up for another class! What's wrong with me? I just keep thinking that I'll fall behind my other classmates because I'm not taking a full load and I really don't want to be in this program forever. If I take one more class, it will also lighten my load for next semester. It's a night class, but it starts at 4:30 which is kind of a problem as I don't get off work till 5:00. But I'm thinking about cutting back my hours to 25 anyway (my boss told me I could if I wanted), so it could work. And I'm starting my on-the-side tutoring job again, so I'll be making a little extra money from that. I only have one year and my car will be paid off! I'm so excited. I'm so close, then I can finally start saving money for my own place. I need to start doing research now so I know what I'm going to do. Okay, I may be jumping the gun a little. Speaking of jumping the gun, there's a great article about the Beatles in Rolling Stone (happiness is a warm gun, don't know why my mind made that connection). 

Phrase/concept/words to remember: desperately random. Future use?

I'm very overwhelmed right now. I have so much to do, I don't even know what to do. Which is why I'm at work writing on LJ instead of working. I need to set up our tutoring program as well as prepare for my own job since school starts next week. I am taking two classes this fall and one is statistics, so really not lloking forward to that. I've also managed to volunteer myself to teach a class. I say volunteer because I don't get paid. Oh yes. I did not realize this, but now it would be irresponsible and wrong to back out. I hate my work email, people won't stop asking me things or demanding things. I feel guilty and irresponsible 24/7. I have no idea if this is an accurate overview of the situation. Maybe I am more on top of things than I feel, but I don't think I am. It's hard to tell. I have a natural tendency to just assume I'm fucking up and letting people down. I don't know, I'm just stressed. And my body hurts. I got my toenail removed on Monday and my whole leg is having nerve pain. It makes my leg really spastic.

I miss the journal, so I'm writing on here. I want to sleep sleep sleep. I like it because everything just blanks out, but I feel like I never get to really enjoy the deliciousness of it as I'm not conscious when it happens. I don't remember my dreams anymore, the way I used to when I was a kid. Tina said some people only need 4 hours. I'm one of those people, my body doesn't deal with sleep naturally. The more I sleep, the more tired I am. But then I struggle with that lack of sleep too. It reminds me of insomnia in the past and what that insomnia meant. Instead of sleeping, I think which only leads to trouble. Such melodrama, I do need to calm down and breath once in awhile. My fingers have a tendency to run away with themselves. I am waiting for a phone call and it's appearance will signal the end of my current daily travails. Then it's away with me to the end of the world or the world encased within the snowglobe of ASU. Not even making sense.

I had a very disturbing dream last night. I think it was partly inspired by all of this swine flu stuff because in my dream there was an epidemic, but it wasn't the flu. In my dream, people were fading away; the world was fading away. It was like the Neverending Story in a way. At one point, my parents and I were in our house and we were afraid to leave because we didn't want to catch the virus and disappear, but at the same time we had run out of food. My dad decided to go outside and find food, but then this huge force came and tried to get him. He ran back inside, but it ripped the front of our house off. Then my parents were gone. I finally ventured out into the world and I was afraid to stop moving because I didn't want to blink out of existance. I was very tired in my dream, but I was afraid to sleep and fade away. People around me would just disappear in a few seconds. I was extremely scared and sad in the dream. It was very strange and I woke up in a strange mood. When I was little I used to read these book of scary stories (Kali, Tina and I ran into one of these books at a Border's and read some of the stories out loud) and I can still remember one particular story and picture that really scared me. In the story, there was a monster with no face. All the features on his face were gone and it was just smooth. I don't know why this scared me so much, but it did, especially the picture.

I just did some research and the monster I'm speaking of is based on a Japanese urban legend. The monster is called a Nopperabou and this is what the site I found it on says: "Though they look like normal people, the nopperabou’s distinctive feature is their face, which lacks eyes, a nose, or a mouth. Instead of normal human features, nopperabou have only smooth skin." It says they're actually harmless, they just like to scare people.

I went to class yesterday to find that it had been canceled. This was kind of a bummer because I really enjoy this class, but there was good news. On the board, my prof wrote that the final was no longer comprehensive, but is going to be based only on the current material we're studying. This makes my life so much easier! I'm pretty much prepared now as I've done about 90% of the reading and have been to all the lectures. I just need to finish up my reading and review. On Wednesday (day of my final) we'll spend the first hour taking the finals and then we're going to use the last two hours for a movie festival. We're going to watch clips from different movies that highlight mental illnesses. I'm very happy about this change as now I can just relax and enjoy the next two weekends in celebration of Tina. In just one week, our dear Tina is to be married! This is amazing and a little shocking. It feels like it just snuck up on us.

Last weekend we threw Tina a bachelorette party at her new house (which was very pretty by the way, even if it is in Levine!). Missy also came down that weekend to visit and surprise Tina. It was an exhausting, but very fun visit. The problem with Missy's visits is that we always try to cram so much in that we just exhaust ourselves and by the last day, we're about ready to pass out. We go to bed very late, then wake up early to get going again. We're always running from place to another trying to squeeze in as much as we can. On Friday we went to Kara's birthday party at Rula Bula's. It also happened to be Guinesses' (I know, spelling) 250th birthday, so it was slightly chaotic. I took Kara in my van without strapping her down which was a little scary for her, but Miss and I assured her she would be fine and she was. I actually ate fish and chips with cider ale, so I felt very authentic and cliche at the same time. I did not brave the Guiness as I don't really like beer that much, especially not dark beer. Kara's friends were very nice, although I didn't get to talk to some of them. One thing that stuck out to me was that all of her friends had some type of disability. I think she just feels more comfortable with people that are similar to her; she seems to be very intimidated of a lot of things in the world. I don't know how she'll cope with being a counselor unless she plans on counseling people with disabilities. That might be a good job for her. Honestly, I think that she's not really thought about the more pratical side of counseling yet, she's still focused on the theory. She's interested in the subject, but hasn't thought about the realities of the profession. I know she's gone through several majors already; I guess we'll just wait and see how this one turns out.

On Saturday, Missy, Kali and I went over to Tina's house and helped set up for her party. We actually weren't that much help as Annie, Vesta and Jen did most of the set up and we just sort of ran errands. We did help with food though! And brought a six foot penis! Tina arrived a little early and her reaction to Missy was priceless although not nearly as priceless as her reaction later on when her mother showed up. A good sized group of people came although I didn't really meet most of them. I basically spent the entire night with the same people I spend most of my time with; so much for branching out. We ate lots of genital shaped food, drank dirty named drinks, and took lots of pictures with the before-mentioned penis (and those pictures better not show up on facebook, especially the one with me licking). We played some silly games and watched the true romance lady give her presentation. I thought she was going to have more games, but she was pretty down to business. As the night wore down, a pretty vicious game of balloon volleyball broke out and I worked off any buzz I still had from earlier. Missy and I got lost onj the way home after dropping Kali off (totally not my fault, there was a detour!) and by the time we got home, we just collapsed into bed. Then I had to go to work the next day while poor Miss had to drive five hours back home. I think she had it worse.

Both of my appointments for today have not shown up. What's going on? That's okay, I feel pretty lazy today. Maybe they disappeared! Maybe they caught the fading flu! This is horrible.

I was accused of never being on lj this weekend, so here I am to defend my lj reputation. I had a surprisingly nice weekend. I don't know why it's a surprise, I guess niceness just surprises me. On Friday I picked Kali up from work (kind of) and we went to Trader Joe's for the makings of a very international dinner. We made vegetarian spring rolls, polenta (my new favorite I believe) and baclava. We timed things somewhat perfectly because we had dinner ready when Tina arrived. Poor Tina was all sniffles and coughing which only got worse the next day it seems. But on Friday she braved through a night of Signs and wedding invites. We managed to get a good chunk of the invites partially done and practiced our fractured cursive. It's clear that Tina has the best handwriting while I once again fall in the middle (Kali, I won't say outright you had the worse cursive, but there's really nowhere left on the spectrum if Tina is the hightest and I'm in the middle).

Saturday night was a lot of fun. Went over to Steffie's and watched Twilight, a much less painful process when alcohol is involved. Withing the first half hour I was drunk as there was just so much to drink to. Steffie made me a White Russian which I adored and then I drank Jack Daniel's which I did not adore. I had to make a lot of Buffy faces while drinking the Jack and finally gave mine to Kali as I was getting really drunk at ths point and knew I had to find my way home at some point in the evening. Kali was very mean and laughed at drunk me. We watched glittery Edward a few times, each time becoming more and more horrified. After the movie we played a game called Munchkin with Steffie's brother Tommy and his friends. Somehow, in my inebriated state, I won. tommy seemed supicious of my drunken state, but by the end I was pretty sober and was mainly playing at being clueless about the rules. Then I left as I had to work the next day. It was pretty lucky that I left when I did, because when I checked my email after arriving home, it turned out that my tutee wanted to meet the next morning, not afternoon. I took her to Changing Hands as the library isn't open on Sunday mornings and we had a surprisingly nice time. She requested that we go back to CH instead of the library in the future. It does have a really nice, relaxed atmosphere that seems to encourage studying. We don't have to worry about disturbing others and Wildflower is next door to provide snacks. We actually ended up getting lunch there before we left. It's a little like having a little sister, only without the annoying parts. Okay, I better go, I'm off to work out. I'm certain I undid all my good work from last week this weekend, so now I have to work extra hard.

I'm feeling particularly overwhelmed today. Sometimes I just feel like such a bad person, like I'm completely irresponsible and let everyone down. Actually I feel that way a lot; I don't really know why. Today it's because I can't really help a difficult student. She's taking logic and I've finally had to admit defeat. I've never taken the course and I shouldn't be tutoring her, I'm only doing it because no one else will work with her due to her "difficultness". She has a quiz on Monday and she's in no way prepared. We've hired a grad student to tutor her, but I'm not training him until tomorrow. I feel like the whole thing is my fault; I just wish I could get it together and do something right. I'm also annoyed because I wish there was more I could do for Missy. I wish I could go to Utah and actually see her in person.

My world is so small, but I keep it that way because I never reach back when someone reaches out to me. I just let people drift away because...I have no idea why. There are so many lost people in my life and I'm so utterly lost the majority of the time in my own head that I can't be bothered to find them. Would my life be better if I did?

On the up side, I'm working out again, went three times this week (counting today although I haven't been yet). At least that's getting back on track.

The time has come the walrus said to speak of many things, of shoes and ships and sealing wax, of cabbages and kings and why the sea is boiling hot and whether pigs have wings. I used to recite this entire poem to myself when I was nervous back in high school. Something about it makes me feel better even though it's quite a sad poem. I could write some sad emo poem maybe, or maybe it would be a good poem. How would I tell the difference? If Emily Dickenson were writing today, would we call her emo or melodramatic? Probably not, we probably wouldn't even know who she was since she never went on a reality TV show.  I would be very judgmental and secretly jealous of Oscar Wilde though. I have to go away now.

I was accepted! Yea for me! My parents don't seem that excited, but they've been in a bad mood for the past few days. It's just a little annoying that they can barely muster up congratulations. My mom says I always excpect too much of people though. Maybe so. My work computer is super annoying and won't let me write much.

Saw two authors this weekend, Alice Sebold and Stephen Chobosky (spelling?), which was just a reminder of everything I've not accomplished, but I still enjoyed it. This computer is so annoying, I really cannot write.

And so I continue to avoid work. I am furloughed tomorrow, but I'm actually looking forward to it. I wish my laptop got internet, it would make my life more entertaining and my nights much longer. I'm feeling very writey lately. Does that even make sense? I just keep thinking about writing, wanting to write, itchy in the fingers and head. Maybe I have lice. Don't think such things darling, it will only make it worse. Words have a tendency to curl off my tongue like old wallpaper around the edges of the walls, but wallpaper probably has more meaning. I tend to talk much, but say little. I'm always hoping that amid the mess of noun and verb phrases, something of value will appear and make me a genius. I am a genius, but only at things people care very little about, like finding things on youtube. One day people will discover my talent and be amazed that they didn't notice before. I would say that I'm talented at avoiding work, but I've seen other people's computers and I know that I am really quite commonplace.

Class is good, my professor is great. He has a dark sense of humor which suits me fine. This week we are learning about OCD which has set my OCD habits into overdrive. This keeps me up long into the night, so maybe I don't need the internet. Or maybe I do as a distraction. My tutoring is also going well. The vocabulary is actually pretty easy compared to what I just got done with and it's a lot of fun coming up with nmemoic (spelling?) ideas with Lisa. We come up with lots of silly stuff. I need to write her dad an email update, thanks for the reminder. I'll do that tonight. I want to find some more tutoring jobs to help supplement my poor waining income (damn you furloughs, but thanks for the excuse for time off), especially if I plan on going back to school next year. I still don't know if I'm accepted yet and am wishing I applied to more than one school now. I am super paranoid that because of the budget cuts, the program will limit the number of applicants it accepts and I don't think I'm that impressive of an applicant. I hope they do interviews, because I'll come off well and I think I'll have a better chance.

Oh, what's to become of me? I'm drifting, this can't be an existance. I feel like I'm just biding my time, but I don't want to spend my whole feeling that way and what am I biding my time for?

and your hands where I can.

Tina's phone called me by accident today perhaps it was trying to tell me a secret, but Tina caught it in the act. It was okay though because my finger hurt and the call distracted me briefly while waiting for Kali in the shadow of Jimmy Carter's fans. They were lined up around the block, thus forcing us to forgo Trader Joe and eat garlic bread pizza which happened to cook for exactly the perfect amount of time. Now the house smells of garlic because I'm avoiding the tupperware packaging that looms in my immediate future. I wish the house smelled like brownies again, but Kali and I evened them out into little pieces until they almost disappeared and new brownie smell is like new car smell; it doesn't last long. Dollhouse has potential, I'm crossing my fingers, but not my toes as I'd have to do it manually and that feels weird. Speaking of weird, apparently i'm the person most likely to wish for others to be hit by the literail as a form of justified punishment for stupidity. I wish I didn't wish such violence, but I do on a regular basis. I can also be quite kind too!

There's a streetlight on the 101 just past the 60 that flickers in an ominious way. I miss iradescent warmth and burn outs; the strange cold flickering of the new lights make me nervous of brainwashing. Are the pulses of energy effeciency sending messages into my brain, is it drilling my teeth or just my eyes? I want to close my eyes when I pass that light at night, block out the serial killer essence of it's dull and rapid blinking, but I don't want to die in a unjustified car accident just yet, especially if it doesn't involve a valuable literail safety lesson.

It's the mid of night or maybe a little past that. I just got home and my finger still hurts. Where's is Tina's phone when you need it?

I love these guys and they have the best videos. Their interviews are the hilarious as well.

Only one more final and it's optional (the final for my A+). Supposedly, it's quite hard (that's what my classmates that took it yesterday said). So I need to study for it this weekend. I got a B on my CED 534 final which means that I have a 96% in the class. i'm hoping that's good enough for an A, but this professor has a weird way of grading, so it might end up being a B. This is what his syllabus says:

Final grades will be based in part on the class distribution of scores. The target grading distribution will be 70% A’s and 30% B’s. This will vary up and down depending upon the specific distribution of scores (overall mean and natural breaks).

This means that even though I earned enough points for an A, I might no get an A if I'm not in that 70% upper half of the class. That is absurd to me and I don't understand it at all. Apparently this is the new trend in grad schools as they don't want to seem like they're giving too many A's. If the students are willing to work for those A's, why not give them? All because I messed up my midterm. This professor is really pissing me off. And the thing is, he's a nice guy! Oh well.

I want to finish my personal statement today or tomorrow. I'm working on it some right now, but am seriously unmotivated. I woke up this morning at 5:00am feeling awful, my head was all dizzy and hurt, I felt all weird, I couldn't breath and my nose hurt so much. I guess this is what you call a sinus headache. I've never had one before, but it hurts! My dad (he's always up at obscene hours in the morning) gave me two tylonol (spelling?) and I fell back asleep only to wake up at 6am with my alarm. So right now all I want to do is go home! It's very quiet today because it's reading day and most students don't have professors that make them come take a final today and stay home to study.

I signed up for Analysis of the Individual next semester. I decided I might as well take it as I'll have to take it once I'm in the program and this cuts down on the number of classes I'll have to take once I'm in the MC program. I've decided to take a statistics class this summer too since that plays in large role in psych and all the psych undergrads in the program have already taken it. Not really looking forward to that class, but it's got to be done!

Okay, no more distractions, must get real work done now. Hopefully, now that the semester's over, my entries won't be so stressed out and whiney all the time!

I want to have fun again! It seems like it's been so long since I've had any type of fun. I took part of my CED 222 final today and passed. So right now I have an A in the class and I'm going to take the optional notes final next week for an A+. Tomorrow I have my CED 534 final which, if my calculations are correct, I need to get at least a D on in order to get an A in the class. I like setting up my grades like this, do well throughout the semester so by finals times the pressure is lessened. I'm pretty sure I can pull off a D, but let's not take anything for granted! Once tomorrow is over, I must finish my personal statement (goal for Wednesday night) and then send everything off to Dr. Rothschild. Then I can maybe relax for a few minutes. I am so tense, every muscle in my body hurts. It hurts to care. When i was an undergrad, I didn't care that much about grades and just sort of showed up. My grades weren't spetacular, but I was a lot less stressed. Now I actually care about what I'm doing as it has a point (and I've experiences the real world and realize that no one just wants to give me money). I was sick this whole weekend with a nasty flu, so I had a lot of trouble concentrating as I was either loopy of medication or dying from the flu. And my body deals with stress in a weird way. Instead of just feeling nervous, I get really cold, like extremely cold, and i become obsessed with warmth. This is why my muscles get all tense, in my attempts at warmth. It's very uncomfortable and I'll be very happy when it's all over. I can finally enjoy the Christmas season and have some fun. Oh, I also need to take my GRE, but I'll deal with that when it comes (in two weeks!). Why do I torture myself so? I'm sick, stressed out, haven't seen my friends in forever, have no money, and I just can't get warm! I can't even be happy about my A today. Oh well, tomorrow it will be mostly over.

BTW, I will post a list of Christmasy type stuff, but I do know one thing: a copy of the DSM IV.

I am so annoyed right now. One of my professors decided that next Wednesday, even though it's reading day and there are no supposed to be no classes or tests, he's going to hold his final. I was really counting on reading day to study for this particular final. I have two finals on Tuesday and then I figured I'd use Wednesday to study for my CED 534 final, but no, we will be taking that test at 8:30am on reading day. This professor was assigned a testing day, as all profs are, but he decided that he didn't want to come in to work after next week, so he's just going to break the rules of reading day. Can you tell I'm a little stressed out? I have15 chapters total to read as of right now and I also need to study all of my lecture notes and powerpoints. I just don't know how this is going to happen. I also need to finish studying for the GRE and finish writing my personal statement. This personal statement is also stressing me out. I hate stuff like that. I need to finish it though to send to one of my recommending profs. I'm not too concerned about my CED 522 class because if I fail any of the tests on Tuesday (both of my Tuesday finals are in that class, he has one based on 8 chapters of Barlow and one based on his lectures), he allows students to take one make up test on his assigned finals day. I want to pass both tests the first time because it would look good and I won't have to worry about that class anymore, but if not, I have another chance. I have a guaranteed B in that class now and these two tests will determine whether I get an A or A+. Of course, I want the A+. I have over 100% in my CED 534 class right now, but I don't know what grade I will get on my final paper until after the test, so I don't know where I stand when it comes to the final. The professor did this on purpose because he said we shouldn't determine how much we study on how many points we already have; we should all study as hard as possible and do as well as we can. This is nice in a fairy tale world where no one has other classes or responsibilities in life so we can focus all of our energy on his class, but it's simply not true. All of us do have other things going on, so we have to PRIORITIZE. Today this prof was telling us how easy we had it in the MC program at ASU and how he had to lower his standards so people in his classes could pass. It's really easy to tell this is his first year teaching. For example, he got upset with us when we didn't do the APA formatting the way he liked it, but he never gave us any guidelines on how to format. I did my APA exactly like OWL at Purdue told me to do it which is apparently different from how he likes it. He's done that several times this semester; he gives us vague assignments with no guidelines, then gets upset when we don't do the assignment the way he wanted. He's also very anti-study guide as he feels that study guides are cheating in some way. When our test covers 11 chapters, plus group presentations and his lectures and additional readings, it would be nice to know what to study specifically instead of trying to know everything which is impossible. So yes, very annoyed right now, lol.

I spoke with my CED 522 prof yesterday and I think I'm going to choose the research option in my MC program so I can lead right in to a doctoral program. If I take the research option, I can begin taking my doctoral classes right away and probably finish up my MC and my PhD in Counseling Psychology within 4 to 5 years. That would be nice, then I can be a clinical psychologist or a research psychologist. I feel a PhD is important because I want to have as much control over my practice and patients as possible. I don't want to have to send them to someone else just because I lack the credentials to treat them properly. I could go straight in to a doctoral program, but 1) the deadlines already passed and 2) I want my MC because it will help me achieve a position as I work towards my PhD. I just feel a PhD will give me more freedom. It was nice to get some guidance from someone that has been teaching in this program for a long time. He's also in charge of practicum which is a big part of the program. I can't wait until practicum; I'll get reall people to practice on! Of course, I do that everyday pretty much with my students, but now I'll receive a grade for it and know if I'm doing it right or totally messing up people's lives!

Yesterday I had an appointment with my autistic student and I was so proud of myself (and him, lol). He wants to change his major, but doesn't know what to, so we've been working on choosing classes for next semester. When he came in, he was close to tears and he refused to talk. At all. He just sat there and looked at the ground while I asked him questions. I realized that he was upset about something more than his indecisiveness, but i also knew that he probably would be uncomfortable with me asking him about it, so instead I said that I would work on my own stuff quietly until he was ready to talk. This was so hard for me! To just sit and not talk to a visibly upset student, it was very weird, but it worked! Eventually he broke the silence and started to talk to me. By the end of the session he was smiling and said he felt better. Silence is one of the big tools that counseling advocates, but it's a difficult skill to master even though it seems really simple. He and I also used a vocational interest test bank together yesterday successfully. He said he doesn't like them because he tends to answer everything with a "I don't know", but we went through one together and I managed to get some real answers out of him, so now I actually have a clue about what kind of classes I should recommend to him. That was exciting too.

I watched a documentary this weekend called Asylum which was scary and very interesting. Its a documentary about an experiment in the treatment of schizophrenics in the 1970's based on the ideas of Dr. R.D. Laing who was a part of the anti-psychiatry movement. Basically (and I mean, very basic as a lot of the theories he came up with are extremely complex and I am still grappling with), he believed that 1) schizophrenia should not be treated as an illness, but as an expression of a person's emotional state and a form of catharsis, thus healthy, 2) counselors can approach these patients through talk therapy and reasoning, 3) medication is no necessary since schizophrenia is not a medical condition, and 4) counselors and patients should live together in a communal setting so as to create equality and a trusting relationship. The documentary was about a communal house where schizophrenics and Laingian counselors lived together in order to test his ideas. This was frightening on many levels. Schizophrenics need to be medicated because it is a biological/medical condition which can lead to violence and suicide. There was one guy in the house named David who was clearly in the middle of a psychotic break and he kept attacking people to the point of stabbing another patient in the chest with a piece of glass. Luckily, it was a small piece of glass, but still! Watching these people in the middle of psychotic episodes made it very clear that they were neither reasonable or expressing an emotional state in a healthy way. David spoke incessantly and he just spoke complete nonsense. Now, Laing would say that David was expressing himself and a therapist should try to piece together what he was attempting to express. One therapist finally declared towards the end of the documentary that he didn't believe that David was attempting to communicate anything valuable or related to a true emotional statement at all, but was simply babbling delusional nonsense. I have to agree with this therapist. By assuming that what a schizophrenic patient says during a psychotic break reflects reality in any way is a dead end. You should not confirm their ideas or emotions at that point as it only does more harm than good. Don't encourage the fear, anger and paranoia of someone who is no longer in control of themselves! I was very angry watching this movie because I felt that the doctors were doing more harm than good to the patients. For a mild schizophrenic, some of Laing's ideas might work, especially at that time when institutions were no more than prisons for patients such as the ones he was attempting to treat, but it's like he went from one extreme to the other. I don't know, I probably don't know what I'm talking about as I only have limited experience and education and no experience with someone during a psychotic episode.

Anyway, to wind this up, I had a nice Thanksgiving, very quiet. My parents are both sick with a bad flu, so I'm praying I don't get it right when I have to take my finals and GRE. My dad is once again super depressed and purposely missed the payment deadline for the community college class he was going to take. My mom is so mad at him about it, but she can't say anything because it will just make the depression worse. Oh well. I hope I can hang out with people this weekend, but I'm not sure because of my finals. I'll have to see where I'm at study-wise. But after next week I'll be free! Well, I still have my GREs on December 17th, lol. but Kali and I have been preparing for awhile, so I feel pretty prepared. I didn't take the practice test yet (I know, dumb Julie) as I ran out of time this weekend, but as soon as my finals are done I will.

I am a freak. Okay, so most people that know me know that already, but sometimes it just hits me and I have to take a step back on ponder why I am the way I am. Two old professors just agreed to write me recommendations for grad school and I am totally freaked out now. I have no idea why, mostly because I feel unworthyof their recs now that they've actually said they would give me one. I was so nervous to ask and now that they've said yes, I'm even more nervous. It's like just when I'm starting to succeed, I want to throw in the towel and give up. I have to keep reminding myself that I deserve to go to grad school. My dad told me the other day that I needd to stop feeling like I'm sneaking in the back door, that I'm just as deserving and talented as everyone else vying for a position in the program, but I can't help thinking that I need to be super tricky and stealthy or they will realize they should not let me in. I often feel the same way about all aspects of my life. I constantly feel like I'm letting people down for some odd reason, or like I'm not keeping up with my responsibilities. Like facebook. People find me and we have lovely conversations, then I just never contact them again. Usually in the beginning I just get busy, but then time passes and I feel like a loser who can't stay in touch with people and like I'm not a good friend, so then I begin avoiding. My avoiding is the worst part because it just makes everything worse. And I feel the same about work. I can't keep up with every student, so then I feel like I'm doing a bad job. I feel that if I was more organized I could do a better job. I guess in the end it's a feeling of knowing I could be a better person if I was just willing to put the effort in, but I don't so I constantly feel I'm letting everyone down. So here's what I want to accomplish tomorrow then over the holiday break (Thanksgiving not Christmas):

Tomorrow:

Send rec professors's samples of my writing and transcripts, along with thank you's
Speak with Dr. Horan after class about socio-psychopath therapy
Combine handout outlines and send to Dr. Sheu (after CED 522)
Finish final paper for Dr. Sheu's class (After CED522 and Tuesday night)
Call Gretchen about insurance
Pay $200 towards car payment this month
Stop by Trader Joe's for Thanksgiving shopping after work
Finish social security paperwork, mail by Wednesday

Wednesday:

Send email aobut Lion King
Add Blumen contacts for last week
Attend open forum interview
Read chpt for CED 534
Create survey on surveymonkey
Send Layla rec info and a thank you

Thanksgiving break:

Send Dr. Rothschild transcripts and statement
Fix room (finish hanging up posters, vacuum, re-arrange crap, make smell nice again! Damn cat)
Clean bathroom
Read chpts 9 & 10 CED 522
Read 2 chpts for CED 534
Study w/ Kali on Friday for GRE
Write Molly
Call Missy (Wednesday night?)
Write Adam
Finish graduate application
Write graduate program statement
Take practice GRE on Sunday
Read (finish?) Benedict, start The Road
Workout

This post is very negative and whiny, but sometimes you just have to get this stuff out I suppose. I just wish I could be happier for myself and not so self-critical. It's more from ego than lack of self-confidence. The problem is I'm too confident in my abilities, so when I do nothing with them or do less than I'm capable, I feel like a loser. I'm actually supposed to be working on my CED534 final paper now, but I've been putting it off. At least I went and worked out today, I even beat my record: 1.21 miles in 21 minutes instead of 1.16. Not that great of a record, but it's something. I set out certain goals for myself to achieve by May (including the weight loss and graduate school) and so far it's not looking great, but  I'll keep working towards them, slowly but surely. I'm slow, but I'm also pretty consistant, sort of like the tortoise. My dad keeps reminding me that even if I don't get in this year, I can reapply next year, but, honestly, if I don't get in this year I'm not sure what I'll do. I've never been turned down for something like this and it would piss me right off if they turned me down. I keep remembering how few students they actually accept and get totally paranoid, kind of like when I'm taking Horan's tests. Of course, I've passed all of Horan's tests, but I'm always surprised when I do.

Okay, cats are fighting so I should go.

i've been meaning to post forever it seems, but I'm finally getting around to it. A lot has happened in the last few weeks. I turned 25 this Saturday which seems so old to me. It feels like I should have a lot more accomplished by now, but I think I would probably feel that way at any age. I keep thinking about when I was little and how I would imagine being grown up. I would imagine myself at 25 and this was deffo not what I imagined. I'm in a constant struggle to grasp onto any semblance of a real life, but I'm not sure what a "real life" is anymore, I'm just constantly sure that I'm not living it.

Anyway, although the above may sound somewhat depressing, I did have a really good birthday. The weekend before my birthday Kali, Tina and I had a combined birthday get together at Allyson's house (why do I always want to spell her name like that?). We had a pot-luck dinner (I love those, as soon as one of us gets another place, we should do this once a week or something) with lots of yummy food including orange chicken from Tina, cheese rolls from Annie and vegetarian lasagna from Kali. I brought cheesecake, but by the time we were finished with dinner no one wanted dessert. Then presents which were lovelyness. I've really been in the mood to read lately and Tina gave me some great comics including an Ender Game's comic aas well as a book which I promptly forgot at Allyson's. I read the Ender comic and it was pretty good, I'll probably look for the next one. The comic was like the novel word for word as far as dialogue goes. I'm not crazy about the artwork, but it's nice to see the visual aspects of some of the finer details such as what buggers look like or future clothing styles according to Orson Scott Card. Kali also got me a lovely book about dead people. However, I've had midterms the last two weeks, so my reading has been limited to psychological theories and no fun stuff. Well, psychological theories can be fun, but dense and very complex. Right now I'm reading Perfume. It's such an interesting book and it makes me want to watch the movie again. Everything in the novel is seen through smell because that's how the main character, Grenouille, sees everything. Everything is described by how it smells, even memories. Smell is one of our most basic and ancient senses and is overlooked often until something smells bad. I gave everyone these pencils called smecils at our party. They're pencils that have scents, hence smecils. Tina really seemed to love hers, it was really cute. Here she was, surrounded by all of these really thoughtful and more expensive presents and she just kept going back to the smencil. The simplest thoughts are often the best, especially if they smell nice.

After dinner we played Singstar which was awesome. I still owe Tina some money for that, maybe I'll buy her dinner tonight. That's a good idea. Tina and I were deffo the most enthuastic players, but I think everyone got into it. I want to play again soon. I didn't even get drunk that night which was nice. Stephanie thought I was drunk, but I wasn't, I was just happy. That week I had my 2nd test in psychotherapy. I was really paranoid about it as his last test was so awful, but I passed thank god. I then found out that he reconsidered the test once again as many people still failed and in the end he just passed everyone. This annoyed me to no end. He did that with the first test because about 95% of the class failed, but not nearly that many failed this time, only about half the class in my estimation. Also, first tests are always difficult, but once people got an idea about the structure of the tests, they should have reworked their study methods to match the test which is what I did. I know, I know, if i had failed the test, I would not be saying this. But I didn't, I worked my ass off to pass it. I had another midterm today and I don't think I did nearly as well. It's only worth 50 points though. There was one short answer question worth 6 points that I didn't answer at all. The rest of the test I felt good about, but 6 points when only 50 points are available is a big deal.

This past weekend I celebrated my birthday with my family. We went to Miele's Bistro; I love love love their food. I had pinapple pizza and cheese garlic bread. So good! Then my parents bought an ice cream cake. my eating this month has been awful and I'm not working out like I should because of studying and illness. Hopefully I can get back on schedule now that things are quieting down some. My dad gave me a lamp for my birthday which was weird. I had this old lamp that I recently replaced because the pole it sat on was broken and it wasn't very bright. Well, when we were taking down the old lamp and putting up the new lamp, I made some offhand remark that it was too bad my old lamp was broken because the glass was pretty. My dad read way to much into this offhand comment and proceeded to cut the pole in half and make it into a table lamp. 1) I don't have a table. Where the hell am I supposed to put this thing? 2) I never really liked this lamp that much. 3) It gives off hardly any light. So that was a weird present, but he put a lot of work into it, so now I feel uber guilty and must find a place for it.

Saturday I went to Weezer with Kali. It was a "free" concert, if you don't count the fact that you have to pay $12 for parking and then another $12 to get into the State Fair (where the concert was). Prices at the fair are so outrageous. $7.50 for a Budweiser! No way I'm paying that kind of money to get drunk off a $2 beer that tastes like piss. Weezer was amazing though and Rivers cuomo is now my new favorite person. He was such a dork! He came out wearing this ski mask and white coveralls (in his defense the entire band wore the coveralls). He then changed outfits onstage to a red jumpsuit that said weezer on the back. His final incarnation included a Kiss sleeveless metal shirt and a headband. During the concert he attempted rap, jumped on a trampoline and did the whitest, dorkiest dance moves that even Al Yankovitch would have to shake his head at. AND HE WAS AWESOME!! Great song selection, so many of the old hits (although only one song off of Pinkerton, what's up with that?) and some new songs. Everyone in the band sang and they did two covers: Pink Floyd and Nirvana. The crowd was great, everyone seemed to know every song by heart and I saw lots of =w='s in the air. At the end, they brought out about 35 people that had won a radio contest and they got to play two songs with Weezer. They all had different instruments including flutes, a xylaphone and even a didgeridoo. It was awesome to see a kid on  cello get to do a rock solo and be cheered on by an entire stadium of people. After the show, Kali and I proceeded to wander around the fair. I took some pictures, so I'll just show the pictures instead of more endless paragraphs that go nowhere.

( State fairs attract scary people )

This album is going to be awesome!

I woke up at 7:30 this morning. Now, anyone who knows me is thinking, "Julie? 7:30am on a Sunday? This does not compute." Well, I woke up because Tootsie was crying her little orange head off and I knew only one thing would make her do that: new kitten! There has been a little grey kitten living in the wheels of my dad's truck and this morning he came into our house and now he is ours. He was really shy when my parents first approached him outside, but I guess this morning he was just waiting at our door and when my mom opened it he just came right in. He is not shy at all now, he's a little attention monster. He just goes right up to everyone and demands to be petted and loved. My mom keeps saying, "well, he's certainly made himself at home." He's explored everything. Tootsie, of course, is outraged. First she chased him, then she hissed and meowed loudly at him, and now she's hiding under the daybed and refuses to come out. On his part, he really wants Tootsie to like him. He keeps going up to her and following her, but she's not having any of it. He's so cute, even smaller than Tootsie. He's all gray with longish fur (not as long as Tootsie's) and big ears and yellow eyes that are a little close together. He definitely does not understand wheels as he's crawled up inside my dad's truck, my van and now has a need to get underneath my wheelchair. He's going to learn a valuable lesson soon, I can tell. My mom and I are delighted and instantly wanted to keep him while my dad is pretending not to like him, but he's so bad at pretending. He went and asked the neighbors if they lost a kitten, but they all said no. If my dad really did not want him, believe, this cat would not be sitting here, he would never have gotten into the house. I want to name him Dorian Gray, but I was outvoted. My dad said he would be embarressed to yell that name out when calling him. My mom also did not like it. We're also considering Paul Newman names since we found Dorian (I like that name!) when Paul Newman died. Any name ideas anyone?

 This is the best picture I can get, he won't say still long enough to get his pic taken.

So that's the excitement right now. I just adore him! He has so much energy, it's crazy. He is very much a kitten and wants to explore and play with everything. I'm kitten-sitting right now as my parents went ot the movies. He just sat by the door when they left and cried and cried, so cute! I just hope Tootsie comes around soon. Anyway, last night was a lot of fun too. Kali and I actually got some studying done for the GRE's. Turns out, Kali's really good at analogies. Surprise, surprise, Kali's good at something to do with logic. I still need to work on those, logic is not my strong suit. I think too hard when I'm looking at them, i just need to turn my brain off. Oh! BTW, Kali got her hair cut mad short! I went right past her in the library, didn't even recognize her. It's going to take me awhile  to get used to it, but when I look at her like I don't know her, it looks really cute. Kind of a Beatles' cut. After studying for at least 1.5 hours (and yeah us), we went to this Thai restuarant called Tipps. It was so good and they had an entire vegetarian menu along with their regular menu, so Kali was happy. I had Pad See-ew which is rice noodles (I love those things), chicken, broccoli and some type of sauce. It was extremely good. Kali and I also shared some veggie rolls with pinapple sauce (they really like using pinapple in their dishes) and cocnut ice cream for dessert. The coconut ice cream was very refreshing. Then we went to see Jane Smiley speak. We met Deborah, her boyfriend wiley (I think that's what is name was, not sure), and their friend Joe there. Jane read from her new book, Ten Days in the Hills which sounded good. I liked the first section she read which was a story from Russia about a cursed husband and wife. After the husband died, the wife did not mourn him, instead she was happy, so when she died they were both in hell together. They were cursed to reenact a scene every week in which the husband hunted the wife on horseback with dogs. When he finally catches hem he shoots her in the head, then slices her open and feeds her heart to the dogs. This is based on a story from Boccaccio's "The Decameron", the whole book is actually. I ended up buying a copy of her book "A tHousand Acres" which is the book she won her pulitzer prize for, and got it signed afterwards. I bought it after I found out it was based on King Lear. Jane was a good speaker and she told us some funny stories after her reading, but it ended surprisingly quickly to me, people in the audience still has questions when they finished and it was only 9:00. Afterwards, we hung out with Joe and Deborah outside for awhile by Tempe Town Lake. It was beautiful outside last night, so we just talked. I ran into Stephanie and a friend who were looking for food, so we suggested late night nosh places to her. We mostly talked English stuff, so poor Joe, who is a computer science major, was bored stiff. Deborah has Castle for a class right now so I gave her my whole theory about him being like the professor in "Disgrace" and that's why he had us read it. Both Deborah and I got excited when we spotted a bar, but you will be proud to knew that we didn't drink. Tipps has sparking sake though, so I must try that. I love sake! After awhile, Kali and I left to go see Choke at Tempe Marketplace. It was really good, very edgy and perverse while still being heartfelt. I credit all of this to Sam Rockwell who was, as usual, amazing. It also had the girl from Trainspotting which made Kali happy. We won free popcorn and a drink too! Since it's Harkin's 75th anniversary, they're giving out scratch cards with free stuff. I won a free drink and Kali a popcorn, it was kind of perfect. I got home relatively early, about 1:00, so I read some of Smiley's book Ibought which is really great so far, and watched the last two episodes of Angel season 5 which makes me getting up as early as I did today all the more amazing. Well, I better go, I have to put the milk up. This weekend has been awesome, so I hope my week continues this way.

Oh, I got some good work news on Friday, well, at least good for TRiO. We've been wanting to do our own ASU 101 class during the regular year and we might have a chance. I mentioned this hope to a woman I'm friendly with from the CLAS advising staff. S he's actually pretty high up in there, the director of advising in CLAS, and I just got an email from her boss saying that CLAS is setting up their academic cluster classes and if I wanted to talk to him about a DRC academic cluster. So awesome! If I could arrange this, it would be huge and make me look really good. If I want Rebecca's job (if she getts Layla's) this would really help me. I finally bought the David Sedaris tickets on Friday, it took forever to get anotherr P-card. Then, when I went to buy the tickets in person earlier in the week, the card was blacked because whoever set it up said no purchasing of entertainment items. And the guy at the box office was about to break the rules for me and sell me five tickets in the front even though he was only allowed to sell on wheelchair companion seat per person. But I managed to haggle two in from with me and three just a few seats further back on Friday, so it's not terrible I guess. Kali and I were talking out getting Weezer tickets for our birthday weekend. Anyone interested in the idea? They's playing October 18th! Okay, this time I really am going to go, I need to check on the nameless kitten. Kitten!