The Topic of Great Randomness

[estar9821]

Ugh...now the ToGR is just becoming a place to rant about how much homework we have. I'll admit I did it too, but....Those of you who are over and done with school, you are very lucky.

Let's make the subject more fun!

Umm...

I got a haircut yesterday.

*can't think of anything to say*

*goes back to homework*

[illiriam]

So I believe that I will talk about anything other than homework since I just finished the last assignment before my spring break. Which is next week, but it starts for me tomorrow because I have no classes on Friday. Woo HOO!.

I am really excited for spring break, because I am just going to sit outside and read non-stop. Because of the H-word (homework) I have not read anything other than textbooks in about two and a half weeks, and I am excited to get through the YW books (I am in the middle of AWAB right now) and possibly even some Harry Potter since I still haven't read my British editions that I got for my birthday. I know they are pretty much the same, but they are new books that have not been read yet and I see that as a travesty.
And the weather has been absolutely GORGEOUS here! Nothing is more exciting than that first day that you can go outside without a jacket and not become a popsicle. Am I Right? (Can everyone tell that I am really excited? Enthusiastic? Giddy? Positively jumping for joy at the thought of 10 DAYS without having to get up and go to class?)

And Seabiscuit, just for the record: Totally jealous. Just sayin. Is it a program with your school or an outside one?

[crazy_bookworm]

I had Reading Week in February, so my next days off are Good Friday and Easter Monday.

illiriam: The British editions of Harry Potter are the ones Canada gets and they are amazing. I think you'll find some different slang than what's in the American ones (but I don't know for sure 'cuz I have never read an American version of Harry Potter), but it should be all good. I love reading books by British authors 'cuz I read in a British accent in my head, then start to think in a British accent, and eventually want to speak in a British accent, even though my British accent isn't all that great some days, lol.

Oh! And 28 days til AWOM comes out, according to Chapters. I can't wait!

I'm excited for spring. The snow is melting, which makes me happy, and I think it's going to stay warm for the rest of this week, which is FAB-ulous. Living with snow for five months of the year some years gets tiring after a while.

I'm waiting on replies/scheduling interviews for a couple things I've applied for. I applied to help out with orientation this fall, and just need to do my individual interview before knowing if I made the cut for it or not. I also had my group and individual interview today for a job I worked at last summer and have applied to again. They're figuring out who they want tonight, phoning our references tomorrow and Friday, and are calling us by Wednesday at the latest. I really hope I get both of them.

Two more physics labs! And nine more lectures! I can't wait to be done! Waves and springs and oscillations aren't my thing, and I'll be happy to be done with them.

Haha. Except for my counting down my physics and reading week, I didn't say a single thing about school.

[Cait]

This is a place for random observations, right? I mean, that's basically what the title says... so I'm gonna assume yes.

No one here seems to "get" me when I suddenly get all excited because the bulbs are coming up and the birds are singing their spring songs, because they don't understand that even though it's still cold, and sometimes even though it's still snowing, Spring has to be here soon, because the flowers think it will be, and the birds are sure it will be. Although, you can't ask the robins because they sing all the time because they're confused by street lights.

Does anyone else notice these little things? Or is it just me and my weird little bio-geek brain that notices the tiniest green buds on trees or the shortest of bulbs coming up from the leaf litter? At home we don't really have bulbs, and Spring weather tends to show up before things start greening up, and surprises all the trees and they all bud and bloom at once (except the cottonwoods) and then a freeze comes along and half-kills the lot of them, and we have fewer cherries than we would have. But they usually survive. Here, in England, it's all sneaky and since everything was already green, maybe it isn't as noticeable to people who've been here all their lives. I was so excited when the snowdrops bloomed, and then the crocuses last week started blooming, and there's a whole GARDEN at a school full of them, and it's gorgeous!

So tell me some of you notice these strange little things in the world around you, and that I'm not nutso! And if you didn't notice- go outside and do so!

[alla]

I notice some things like that. Such as when the Jacarandas are blooming around Brisbane, spring is on its way, and its time to start studying for end of semester exams. I'm more apt to notice changes in weather patterns than changes in the plants and animals around me (but then, we only get pseudo-winters, and most of the trees are evergreens...). The Jacarandas were amusing during my second year of study. For some reason they began blooming about a month before they usually did, and everyone on my campus panicked (my uni has a rather large population of them).

I thought TOGR had always been a discussion area for homework things. Its kinda our venting area, and with the age bracket that we have here, homework is a very big thing in our lives.

I've been busy applying for jobs lately, and this afternoon I got a call. I have a job! I can now call myself an employed geologist, and not just one by training! Its with our state geological survey. I start on Monday! Its going to be good to have something to do with my time, other than sit around and wait for feedback from applications

[Lazy Leopard]

Funny thing; I always associate jacarandas with November, but not with spring. In Kenya November's supposed to be one of the rainy seasons. The other's supposed to be in April. Neither really corresponds to spring, though, as Kenya, being on the equator, doesn't get the seasons more temperate regions have.

Here it's way too cold for jacarandas, but the cherry and apple blossom will be out in a month or so, and some of the early flowering trees are showing signs of blossom already.

[estar9821]

Cait, your location says Albuquerque, but you said England. Is that a joke, or is there really an Albuquerque in England?

Has anyone here read Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer? I'm rereading it now, it's really good. Here's what it says on the inside flap:

"When Miranda first hears the warnings that a meteor is headed on a collision path with the moon, they just sound like an excuse for extra homework assignments. But her disbelief turns to fear in a split second as the entire world witnesses a lunar impact that knocks the moon closer in orbit, catastrophically altering the Earth's climate.

"Everything else in Miranda's life fades away as supermarkets run out of food, gas goes up to more than ten dollars a gallon, and school is closed indefinitely.

"But what Miranda and her family don't realize is that the worst is yet to come."

This book is told in Miranda's diary entries. Yes, it is apocalyptic, but it has a happy ending.

[alla]

Oh, Alla, fall is coming where you live, isn't it?

Yes, autumn is coming where I live. Its half arrived. The weather that we're getting at the moment (which has been almost back to normal this year after extended El Nino conditions - YAY we got our monsoon low) is what I'd normally associate with the end of summer .

[96bookworms]

estar- that book sounds really cool!


YAY!! I am officially declaring it spring!!!!! It's actually warm out, and I've been able to walk around town without a coat, and not FREEZE!!

There is no school today OR tomorrow, which means that because of a stupid snow day, this weekend is longer than our easter break!!! I'm still happy, but unfortunately, because of a different snow day, we have to go to school of monday AND we have STUPID standardized tests on Tuesday (the little ones, not the big ones.....)also, all my friends are out of town.....


I've been rereading a few really good books, a series called The Seems, and some books by wendy mass. they are all pretty good. I'll go into detail some other time, though.

[Lazy Leopard]

YAY!! I am officially declaring it spring!!!!! It's actually warm out, and I've been able to walk around town without a coat, and not FREEZE!!

I made that mistake yesterday, and what's happened today? It's raining, cold, and the forecast indicates a possibility of snow showers. Oh well. At least the days are getting longer now. Not long 'til the equinox, and then we can say that it's spring officially.

[illiriam]

Congrats alla on being employed! That has got to be incredibly exciting, and I hope your first day goes well.

The weather tricked us here too. It was all nice yesterday and Wednesday, so I thought that it would be nice over the weekend despite the predictions for rain. But it is not. It is rainy, and we have a moat instead of our drainage ditch. At least it should keep the Black Knight away.

I was really excited to run errands today though, despite the torrential downpour. I get excited to use my umbrella, and I sent my best friend her birthday present. Her birthday is on St. Patrick's Day, and she gets bummed when people only remember it because it is the same as the holiday. She also hates shamrocks for this reason. So I made her a charm bracelet, and restrained myself from putting one on there. I did add a horseshoe. And since she has been reading so many books where the man is Irish of Scottish, and has fallen in love with those accents, I made her a shirt that says, "Kiss me you're Irish". It's fun to tease your friends.

On a completely unrelated note, who doesn't love baking? It is so much fun. This weekend I plan on baking cupcakes, and butterscotch oatmeal cookies, and a german chocolate cake (not all for my household though). Any one have a fun recipe that they like baking? Or cooking?

[96bookworms]

It rained a little bit here, but hey, rain is better than snow any day!

I just finished a pretty good book called Wicked Lovely.....it's about fairies that this one girl can see. Note: these are not your everyday good fairies. Many of them are just plain BAD!

I really like cooking, but i can't think of any good recipes

[Cait]

Estar- no, no joke, but it's not what you think either. I'm just on Study Abroad in Sheffield this semester. Come June I'll be back in the Q.

I've been reading the Alvin Maker series that Orson Scott Card wrote. 'S pretty awesome. I got the giggles the other day 'cause the storyteller character and Alvin were discussing this creepy black nothing-ness that Alvin sees, and they're talking about how it just shakes things down to nothing. It shakes big pieces into smaller pieces and smaller and smaller til they're gone. And then the whole universe is dark and cold and empty. And then Alvin takes a little oath to fight it, (but not a good formal long one, mind you) and I went, "I think Orson Scott Card and Diane Duane were drinkin' the same water!". Then I didn't feel so bad that every good idea I've ever felt I had, someone else had first. I guess it happens to great authors, too!

[Zirsta]

Spring... Lucky people. I'm probably not going to have anything remotely close to spring until the end of April. I mean, we got, like, a foot and a half of snow last week! *sigh* Go away, annoying cold!

96bookworms: I love Wicked Lovely! Haha, BAD is definitely a good description... Evil, malevolent, violent, take your pick.

Things around my house have been very quiet... Perhaps from the absence of my sister. No more blaring music and giggly teenage girls. She's in France for a school trip, lucky her. She was in Paris last week, and now she's staying with a host family in Provence. I don't know, when she first left it was kinda nice, but now I just miss her.

I've been reading a TON over spring break. My favorite has been Hunger, by Michael Grant. It's the sequel to Gone, which is basically about how all the adults and people over 14 disappear. The beginning is really rushed, but it's really good once you get into it.

[Garrett Fitzgerald]

"Faults"

I did the Librivox Weekly Poetry Reading yesterday. 22 of us read "Faults", by Sara Teasdale. Mine's the 9th, as they're posted alphabetically.

http://www.archive.org/details/faults_1003_librivox