Chronically Distracted

I am a liar.
I declared that I'd post for a week about the things I'm grateful for, and I only posted 5 days. But, just like the rest of this 365 thing, I'm bending the rules and posting 7 posts all together of what I'm grateful for.

#6: Critical thinking skills/Being good at school.

There is one thing I definitely know I'm good at, and that is school. Up until now I've gotten straight As (although not so sure about my spanish class grade). This totally sounds like bragging, but honestly, I don't go out much for fun, I don't go hang out with a lot of friends just because, I am usually in my room working on a paper, studying, or reading. And even though it's difficult, frustrating, and stressful, I love it. The class I took on writing research papers was very hard and I had many late nights cursing every thing I had to do in that class, but I loved what I learned and the outcome. My overzealousness (woo! new word!) has gotten me into trouble, because I'll often begin writing an essay that is way longer than it should be. I'm trying to learn how to remedy that. I've been called an over-achiever and freak many times, and though I'm still not used to it, I know it doesn't matter.

In high school I was well on my way to having a 4.0 for most of the four years, until I got sick and had to have my kidney transplant (5 years ago!). I couldn't study as hard, I felt ill prepared to do a lot of the work that would have been annoying but easier to accomplish if I wasn't recovering from having my abdomen cut open and a tube put in my neck. In college, as I kept getting better at school, and started my A streak, I felt like I was getting what had been taken away from me, in a way, back in high school. I'm not trying to make this into a sob story, but this is one of the many things that pushes me to succeed in school.

Really, it might not be all that healthy, my semi-obsession with school. But I have learned that I can always learn from books, that there will always be a teacher when I need one, and that I can go forth and research my way through many a difficult situation. I need to learn how to take a few step backs and realize my self-worth is not linked to my GPA, but considering how ingrained my habits have become, I'm willing to give myself some time.

Right now, I gots to study for a mid-term!! :D

Didja know that the Aztecs had a ceremony called the New Fire Ceremony?
Every 52-year period kept track of the solar years, and at the end of each 52-year period there was the possibility that the world would end. They believed/knew it was at the end of a 52-year period, but they just didn't know which one. So at the end of each period they would do the New Fire Ceremony; all the lights would be put out, and everyone would gather at the main temple. Then if the sun came up, a person would be sacrificed (probably someone who volunteered to be, maybe a noble), and they'd (warning: this might be a bit graphic!) cut his chest/abdomen open, pull out his guts, and start a fire in his chest cavity. And all the lights would be lit using this fire.

Now, back to my making my study cards!

I somehow managed to get more sick last night. Hooray for me!
My sinuses hurt :(

Here is the cute video of the Coro Allegro singing!:



And I actually took this video myself! That's why it's all shaky and not very well done!!

Being sick and having two midterms this week is just not working for me, I wish I had had some kind of warning this would happen. But hey, at least I had a fun weekend :)

Accordion players are so awesome.

Those Italian Americans sure know how to party ;D
Also, they have good taste in flag color (red, white, and green. just add an eagle holding a snake on top of a cactus, and it's like cinco de mayo!)


DSC02682
Originally uploaded by Kidney Love

( a coupla more pics! )

Tomorrow: video of the Coro Allegro!

Having too much fun to post!
It's so nice to be around someone who is so AWESOME.

Luckily, although many of my favorite cool people are far away, she's close enough for the occasional visit.

And since my stomach is hurting from laughing so much and I'm still exhausted from being sick, I'm gonna cut this post short.


Now if only I didn't to study or do any homework . . .

Tomorrow: pictures from festa italiana!!!
:D

In the honor of my friend spending the night, here's another music video (*shock* *surprise*).
She introduced me to the wonder that is the dresden dolls

I am sick.
Chicken soup that my mom made is soooooooo delicious.
Hot water is so good.
I really, really hope I feel better tomorrow.

And that when I wake up all my homework is magically done.

That would be wonderful. Mmm, soup.

Also, I just realized that I posted a few days ago with the title of sick, and after writing about feeling overwhelmed and needing to rest, I posted a music video.
And I feel bad about posting so many youtube videos, but ugh, so tired, exhausted, and sore throaty.
I guess I should have rested back on day 113. Maybe I should listen to myself more often.

(I have no apologies for this, I just really like this song).

"Yes, my father and mother are from Mexico, but I'm from Spain." - George Lopez

I love laughter, comedians, dealing with problems through humor, keeping people who make me smile close to me. I do smile easily, and my response to almost everything is a smile. I've got the warm smile down to an impulse, so that I can use it at my will. I know that my laugh is loud and sometimes disturbs others. I try to work to keep it at an appropriate level, until I'm somewhere safe and happy.

Thank goodness for humor, and thank goodness for parents who know how to laugh.

if you like lord of the rings and mystery science theater 3000, or just very funny commentary during movies, you'll love this:


(i really need more lj icons)

Paper, midterm, presentation, spanish, accents, music, skeletons, late night library meetings, talking, reading, memorizing, wake up early, don't listen, try to talk, park far away, wander, lay on my bed, listen to nothing, want to stop hearing my thoughts, music can't distract me enough.

Lists of ideas, lists of grammar, lists of words, lists of pictures, lists of homework, lists of definitions, complications, decisions.

Drink water, eat dinner, take medicine, wonder what it is I did wrong this time, can't wait to get tomorrow over with, feel gone.

I'm grateful that I can tell when I'm completely overwhelmed, and know that I should start looking for ways to keep myself sane, even if I don't always know what they are. And I'm grateful for my weird optimism that I can't seem to squelch, even when I feel like I'm stuck in a bottomless of pit of homework and stress.

Here's a weird music video in Italian for all of you to watch :D

I am very, very grateful that I can sing and play the piano. I know I am lucky that not only did my parents encourage me to learn how to play an instrument, but also had the time and money that allowed me to take singing and piano lessons at the same time. And they always came to my recitals. I know not every kid gets to experience those things, and I'm so happy I did. I immensely miss taking singing lessons. If I had any time I'd probably start taking piano lessons so that I could accompany myself. Someday I will. As a result of all this musicals hold a very special place in my heart.

When Rent came out I wasn't that into it, but one particular song wouldn't leave my head, The Tango Maureen.



Now after watching Neil Patrick Harris and his boyfriend David Burtka singing Take Me or Leave Me (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=afXPs7AohZg), I searched youtube for the scene from the movie. Quickly I realized that I didn't remember the movie very well, and maybe I didn't give it enough of a chance when I saw it.

After singing along to Rent songs all day I want to watch the movie again so badly. I'm feeling musical deprived. Hopefully sometime in the next month I can bring my beautiful keyboard to my place and play on it some. I think that'll help me relax more, because playing the piano has always helped me calm down when I'm feeling overwhelmed.

I'm the luckiest girl.
I have amazing friends, an awesome boyfriend, great family, and the ability to critically think about things.
Given my tendency to stress out too much, and to berate myself constantly for not being responsible enough, I think I should just let all that go (a little) and enjoy everything I have. Not in a hedonistic way, of course, but in a grateful way!
This next week I'm gonna blog everyday (with pictures!!!) about something that makes me think I'm extremely lucky and that I am very grateful for.

And instead of writing something lengthy, I'm going to refer you to these two webcomic strips, because I find them hilarious. The webcomic itself (Least I Could Do) is on the pervy side, but these comics are relatively not (the pervyness of the second one could be debated, I think it's cute :) :

(oh, and if you're religious with no sense of humor, the first one will probably offend you ;)

http://www.leasticoulddo.com/comic/20051109

http://www.leasticoulddo.com/comic/20080308

Okay, still feeling drained, but I'm going to make an effort to actually write something.

I feel like just giving up in class, in regards to getting to know other students. Or I felt it.
In one class, the class with reading that has been quite difficult to get through, we have reading quizzes. Which would be fine, if the reading didn't seem so complex and difficult to understand.

One specific section of the reading, a letter from and a letter to Simon Bolivar, made me feel like a homework zombie. I began reading it, and started highlighting parts, but as soon as I was done highlighting something I'd immediately forget why I was marking it.
And of course I couldn't remember what it was about.

Up until today I've gotten nearly perfect scores on my reading quizzes (a few felt like really lucky guesses). I don't think others have been as lucky. Some of the other students were talking before class, and they were all perplexed by the reading. The only part I didn't enjoy was the Bolivar ones, the letters from Jose Martí were actually pretty entertaining, even though they were still difficult to read. The other problem the students were having was that they felt that we jumped from learning about the Aztecs, to suddenly learning about the independence from Spain of several Latin American nations. I wanted to tell them that it really wasn't that big of a jump: Spain invades Latin America, kills and tortures a lot of people, sets up their colonies, the King of Spain decides it's a great time to start taxing them and setting up all kinds of rules, the American born Spaniards, or Criollos, rebel and try to create their own nations. And I tried to explain how I understood it, to be helpful at least (although I think I sounded more authoritarian), but nobody really understood.

I get why it was hard, the readings did seem like quite a jump, and if I didn't already know a few things about this history I'd be pretty lost too. Plus it seems like we're reading mostly source material, instead of the interpretation of said source material, which might of helped with the understanding part. I felt a little lost too, mainly because I was unsure about what the quiz was going to be like and what we were supposed to get out of the readings.
The girl who sits behind me said, oh you're gonna get an A (how do I build that reputation so quickly? sheesh). I honestly thought I'd be totally lost on the quiz, so imagine my surprise when I was pretty sure about 3 of the five answers, and think that I got the other two after rolling the questions around my mind a little. It was really satisfying. :D

Anyways, what was really bothering me was how my sincere interest and enjoyment in the revolutionary letters of Jose Martí would probably seem insane to most of the other students. Before class when were talking about the quiz and the reading, and everyone was talking about how hard it was, I mentioned that the only part I didn't like was the Bolivar part. Which was met with silence. A real familiar silence.

I loved it because not only did I think it'd be a lot more interesting if more people were able to write and talk like that, with very long sentences and imagery, life would be more interesting, but also because his words helped bring on a revolution. He honestly believed in equality and the bringing up of great nations in Latin America by looking inward at the needs of the country, instead of trying to imitate European ideals. And he knew that the United States would soon come prowling to snatch up Cuba. To me, that's amazing.

But to everyone else, not so much. Especially with those long sentence and flowery language. I don't mean to imply that I found it easy to read, just that it was very interesting and awe inspiring in a way. Especially awe inspiring that his ideas were clear enough that I was able to grasp the ideas and understand what he was saying.

Even though I thought I had gotten used to the silence that comes when I admit to loving school and some of the harder aspects of it, and even though I thought I had learned not to profess my love for it as often, it still catches me by surprise when everyone else doesn't seem to get it.

(so much for being tired and unable to write, huh?)

Wiki:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Bolivar
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jose_Marti

My Desktop:


Desktop I
Originally uploaded by Kidney Love

And My other Desktop:


Desktop II
Originally uploaded by Kidney Love

This amuses me way too much right now.
I turned the visualizer thing in itunes on (the thing on Desktop II with the purdy colors), put it on fullscreen, and that was the only way I could get homework done without being completely distracted by the internet.

Goodnight!

(I apologize for the sheer boring of this post, but I'm planning to use more pictures, since I recently remembered that was one of my goals doing this 365 thing, and hey, at least it's a start!)

I'm feeling some heartburn, which may be from the medicine, but I'm not really sure.

My energy level has been somewhat crazy lately, and I can't seem to concentrate on homework. But of course I can concentrate on anything else that isn't homework. If I got to go to the gym, maybe I'd be able to burn off some of this excess energy, but I can't because I need to do homework. Homework, homework, homework.

I almost posted earlier today, but I was trying to read stupid homework.

It feels like it's already two days into this week. I have a paper due tomorrow, a spanish quiz, and then a lot of reading to do for Wednesday. Which I probably could have done today, but I kept getting distracted. Every semester (or quarter) I think, this is the semester that's going to break my straight As. And not every year do I believe it. This year, I thought I'd easily be doing the work for my classes, just waiting until I graduated. I think that's almost what senior year of high school felt like, but I don't remember it that well (in terms of the homework and stress level). This year the reality of school work has once again caught up to me, and I'm starting to worry again (as noted in my previous post).
I'll let you know after I get this quiz and my next couple of papers back how well I'm doing.

(Although I did get an A- on another paper! Woo!)

I feel lost today, not sure what to write about.
I have a quiz in my spanish class on tuesday, and I'm not looking forward to it.
I'm going to aim for a B in this class. Because that's easier and probably healthier than attempting to keep up my straight A streak.

That sounds completely arrogant of me to say, that I'm going to aim for a B in lieu of getting an A, but I'm notorious amongst people who know me, and professors who have gotten to know me, for putting a lot of pressure on myself to do a good job and underestimating my ability to succeed.

I have wonderfully strong fear of failure, so that doesn't help either.

Therefore, not craving more than a B in my spanish class sounds about right to me. Because there are so many other things I have to deal with than beating myself up to get an A in a class that is already hard for me.

(Wow, it's kinda weird to be in the triple digit days.)

Today was the first day in a long time that my family has been to WalMart. I (read:my mom) bought Eclipse, the third book in the Twilight series there. (I swear this isn't going to be about Vampires). It was pretty much on sale, so I grabbed it quickly because my addiction is that bad. Now, we were in WalMart to buy some things that I needed, so my weird guilt over buying the book there is pretty silly. Ever since I read the book Nickeled and Dimed I've been wary of WalMart, even though I don't think me not purchasing things there will do much to make such a huge company pay and treat their workers well. I just feel weird buying things there now, and for some reason the guilt of buying the book did not extend to the other things that were bought and that I'm going to use. Maybe it's because I somehow figured that I actually need those things, instead of just having a small addiction to them.

Even so, I got the book, and was pretty excited when I came home. And then I remembered.


WalMart censors their music, movies, and books.

I thought, maybe I can check around online and find out if this particular book was censored in any way.
No amount of googling brought me any information. So I e-mailed the publisher.
Hopefully the do write me back and let me know, and if they don't I'm probably going to return it just in case.

If I'm paying money to read a book, there is no way I will read a censored version of that book. It disappointed me that there was no sort of database online to let people know, but it kinda makes sense since WalMart is so freaking huge.

I guess I learned my lesson; steer clear from WalMart, and if I want to buy a book just go to the book store or go to the library. It's not like it's going to actually hurt me to wait to read these books. *sigh*

Okay, I think it's time to amend a new rule to my daily blog posting.
If I post before I go to sleep, then it counts, even if it's after midnight. Because this is just ridiculous. I'll try to post before midnight, but these last minute posts are just going to make me feel like a failure, and I have too many issues with that as it is. So from this night on, that's my new rule.

I'm so tired, but I had lots fun hanging out with friends at a b-day party, even if I did manage to finish my paper yet.

Here's the movie I'm writing my "film review" on:


It's not necessarily a film review so much as trying to meet all the requirements of the paper. I really hope I can get all my homework done before monday (that seems to be my theme lately, doesn't it?).

Ugh, I'm really freaking tired now, so sleep time!
(Man, the next book in the Twilight series is really messing with my head . . .)

Woo hoo!!! DAY 101!!!

Although I am quite tired I now I promised another post!

Here it is:
I had a plan when I wrote my earlier post, and hopefully I can remember what it was.
Because I wanted to write about Twilight, the books by Stephenie Meyer.

I avoided reading this book as much as I could and I really wish I hadn't. Because I would have read them while in Portland and not now when I have waaay too much homework for distractions.

I love Twilight, it's such a good book. Normally people might think, well of course she likes it! It has vampires! Sofia loves crazy/weird/spooky stuff like that! That is definitely not totally true.
I do love stories with vampires, and werewolves, and sometimes ghosts and skeletons. But, I like good, not too scary stories involving those kinda of characters. If the story is too gruesome, too much about sex, too dumb and full of clichés, I ain't getting into it.
The reality of it is in my own imagination I like using things like a girl werewolf as a metaphor for other things. Give me a girl with superpowers and I can find some deeper meaning. I'm not good about writing about myself outright, so these are great disguises for a girl who was once and still sorta is quite shy.

But back to Twilight.
I don't know if Stephenie Meyer just never read a vampire book before, or just knew exactly how to avoid the clichés but she's written the best vampire lore I have ever read (though i still have to finish Dracula . . .).

I've heard from my friends who were urging me to read it that it wasn't necessarily ground breaking, or illuminating in any way, but I think that the book is amazing because it makes vampires into something that makes sense. The story is completely fantastical and obviously not real. Yet it still managed to completely wrap me up in it's reality, and not think "been there, seen that" (kinda like True Blood did in the second episode).

I believe that that's because everything the characters do makes sense. One thing leads to another in an inevitable way (except for parts of the ending, but those parts were needed to finish the story). I'm really not a huge fan of vampires. I read a bunch of good young adult fiction about vampires once upon at time, like I wrote in a prevoius post, and came to the conclusion that vampires are way too prissy for my tastes. Either too tortured or too into themselves. This book gave such a different view that I actually enjoyed reading what Edward had to say because he didn't make excuses for himself. He just did what he felt was necessary (and not in a "oo, i'm an evil badass who makes Big decisions, look at me decide to hurt you! are paying attention now? pay attention to me! hurry!" way, because that also falls under the label of prissy). I definitely liked not having to sit through a(nother) story about a sad vampire.

Don't think that this post is all about Edward, though. I mean he's an amazing character, but I did not fall in hopelessly, madly in love with him. I fell in love with the world that Stephenie Meyer wrote, and I will soon be reading more. Hopefully at some point I can come up with my own written complete universe.

Okay, no more vampire posts after this! I promise!! (well, not until the movie comes out!)