No, I'm not dead
But my computer's harddrive is thus the lack of updates. I don't like to make updates from work but I figured I should do one.

I went to my parents' new house this past weekend. It was a lot bigger than I expected and really quite nice. They need thicker blinds in the bedrooms though. So I got to see the house, saw Ka at the MGM Grand hotel and gambled a bit. Also got nagged about what I'm doing come 2006 and my weight...you know, the usual stuff. Then I also went to my 5, yes 5, doctor's appointments. Never fun stuff. Especially the dentist. *shiver*

Other than that it has just been work, work, work. Except that work has been pretty dead. Dead enough that Leigh took off 3 hours early. I would have too except that there really should be a lead or staff member around and with Jim out...well I also have nothing better to do so I might as well get paid for being bored, no? It'll make a nice cushion of spending money for London =) (BTW, who wants presents? ;-) ).

I also need to start working on finishing my senior project. Yes, I'm STILL not done with it. Really it's just a lack of motivation since I already have my grade for it.

I've also been going to the gym and riding my bike to school MWF. It's amazing how much energy you get from stress. Now that I'm practically stress free, going to the gym is such a chore and I'm not doing as much as I used. It might also be because I no longer have a workout partner =(. Any takers? I really need a way to make it fun again. Without the stress preferably.

I'm not sure how I did it...
Mood:  surprised
Topic: School
...but I did.

Grades for Spring 2005:
Economics: A
Plastics: A
Number Theory: A-
Analysis III: C

Everything but Analysis surprised me. I thought it was impossible for me to get an A in Econ with out getting a 100% on the final but I guess maybe the curve in there got lowered. I thought similarily about Plastics but I also wasn't sure about my lab grade so maybe that brought it up. Number Theory there must have been a curve because I got 39/48 on the final and when I weighted my grade per the syllubus, I came out with an 86% for the class. I'm not complaining though =).

I was so happy to see those A's. Not only do I have above the 3.3 to graduate with honors, but my cumulative GPA went UP. My major GPA will probably suffer a bit with that C but that's okay. At least I didn't fail, which is good. Anyway, since I'm at work (yes, I'm being paid to write this) I'll sign off for now.

Jenny!
Mood:  special
Topic: Personal
Last night Bridget and I went to Santa Barabara for the evening to meet up with our friend Jenny for dinner.

Jenny went to UPenn making it very difficult to get together with her on a normal basis so we try whenever she's in California. Well Monday I remembered her saying that she was going to be in town this week so I e-mailed her seeing if we could get together. She replied saying that meet Tuesday night or Friday night. Although I didn't get this until Tuesday morning. After talking with Jenny and with Bridget we decided that we could make Tuesday night work. So Bridget and I biked to my place and then we drove down to Santa Barbara.

We met at Barnes & Noble on State street and then we had dinner at this pizza by the slice place. We ate, we talked and Jenny gave me my birthday present. It was quite funny because in the card she wrote that I was 23 when in fact I am 22. I whispered to her that I was 22 and then she starts cracking up because she said that she wrote that thinking that we were the same age but then it dawned on her that she's not 23 either. We had a very good long laugh about that. Then she gave me a cute stuffed frog that croaks. After dinner we walked along State street but by then most places were closed. So we walked until we could walk no further which was the end of th pier. Despite being foggy, it was very beautiful out there. Then we headed back and parted our separate ways since it was nearly 10:30.

It was so nice to see Jenny again. Bridget, Gianna, Jenny and I try to get together at least once a year but for the past two years I've gotten to see her twice =).

*squeals loudly*
Mood:  celebratory
Topic: Personal
MY BROTHER'S ENGAGED!!!!!! :-D
Congratulations Justin and Tiffany! :-D

Oh I am so happy for them! This is so great!

I knew once my mom told me to call Justin when I talked to her downstairs. So I immediately called his cell phone and he called back just a few minutes ago. He had a hard time understanding my squeals of happiness ;-). And he promised all of the details of the proposal (which happened last night) when we see each other in Vegas.

*continues to squeal* Yay! This is so exciting!

A Procrastinator's Ramblings (part "lost count long time ago" of "way too many to predict")
Mood:  chatty
Analysis studying has been going blah. I've looked about 60 of the 80 or so problems assigned throughout the quarter. I've only been able to 20 of them. Some of the ones I can't do are the ones we even turned in (obviously I got them wrong the first time too). Blarg. Wednesday is going to suck so much. At least Michelle took 2 of my hours from me at work which works out nicely. It will allow me to go to the gym and attend the Cardio Fabulous class which I've never been to before. And then I'll be on track for studying from 1-8:30 or so. I was thinking about going to the Step class too at 4 but I think I won't considering how much I'm not absorbing Analysis.

Speaking of gym classes, I went to the abs one today. I hadn't been to the abs class since last spring. I tried it at the start of Winter quarter but didn't care for it because I didn't feel like I worked anything. And then naturally I was scared to do intense abs work. Since then I've been slowly working my way back up. At first I was just doing 25 crunches then sitting up for a break and then a second set. Then I went to doing 25 crunches in the middle, and 25 on each side with some lying down pauses between sets and whenever it felt like too much. And more recently I've gone back to where I was before, 3 sets in the middle and one on each side for a total of 125 with some pauses (although yesterday I nearly went straight through). So I felt confident to try the class again and especially since I could actually make it this week. Although I think it was at the same time during the quarter and I could have technically done it, just not changing for class like I did Tuesdays and Thrusdays but my class was in the silo which is a) farther b)more people packed more together. Not to mention that leaving about 5 minutes early in a half hour class is kind of a lot. Anyway, I didn't feel too out of place attending in the last week since the instructor was subbing for someone else for this week so she didn't know per se that I was "new." And I found out that she'll be teaching the abs and step classes over the summer. She said it would be the first time she'd be teaching the step class which was good news to me so hopefully it won't be too intense, especially with my knee and calves acting up the way they have been lately. Actually I had to cut my treadmill extremely short today but my left leg just didn't feel right at all after a few minutes. Normal burns I would try to work through but this one today was different...it really hurt but it wasn't my knee like it has been for the past 5 weeks or so. Afterwards, the pain shifted to my right quad and hamstring. Go figure.

Interesting...this started off as an "Analysis sucks!" post and turned into a gym post. And now turning into a "silly Valencia" post. So they sent us those notifications about painting for last week but only did railings and the fronts of 4 sections. When I came home today, they finally covered our windows so I guess we'll be painted tomorrow. It's just so silly that they apparently got hardly anything done last week and are now bugging us during finals week. And poor Julie...she has had to keep her windows closed for th past week for the non-existant painting. At least it has been cooler the past couple of days so she hasn't had to suffer too much from the heat.

KME Founder's Award
Topic: Math Club
Remember that award I "won"? Well apparently I was slightly wrong about it. I get $200 instead of $100. That's pretty cool. Although when you consider that because I never got receipts for the pizza for the softball games, that's really only about $90 I'm getting. Anyway, apparently it's a scholarship check so it's not going into my student account so I guess it's "free" money.

Now if only I could get $200 for everytime I do a sucky job at something...I'd be so rich!

Edited to correct a runaway link tag (stupid quotation mark)

Ode to Math Clu
Now Playing: Pink's "Don't Let Me Get Me"
Topic: Math Club
Ode to Math Club
I thought I always did what was best,
How was I to have guessed
That you would silently protest
And thus lose interest?

I thought we were having fun,
Making the club open to everyone
But silently you had begun
Me and the club to shun.

I thought this is where I did belong
That I'd be a leader and be strong
But it didn't take you long
To Show me that I was completely wrong.

I thought hard I did try
But privately I did cry
Until to myself I could no longer lie
And decided to bid Math Club goodbye

I did what I thought best
And as you did suggest
My resignation was truly blessed
And the one thing you didn't detest.

Crazy Past 5 Days
Mood:  not sure
Now Playing: "Keep It Up" by J & R Project on "Trance Party Vol. 3"
After spending 6 hours last night running Disk Doctor and Speed Disk, my computer seems to be running okay. No more clicky noises, and it took less than 50 minutes for it to boot up this morning. It just has to last me a couple more months but it has been good to me for the past 4 years.

In school news: one final down, 3 to go. I took my Plastics final yesterday morning after they finally figured out what happened to my test. I was supposed to have taken it Thursday afternoon. Apparently, when my professor e-mailed the exam the Wednesday before, it got labelled as junk mail. And as the woman at the DRC said, "what does that say about [my] test?" ;-). Anyway, I think I'll probably get a B in the class. B+ if she does +/- grading but I don't think she does. And soon I'll be getting my butt in gear for my date with Robert Kennedy and just be doing Analysis until my eyes bleed or until the time of the final. Whichever comes first. Then I'll start studying for Number Theory and Econ. I think I stand a chance of an A in Number Theory but it will really depend on how I do on the final. Econ I'll definitely be getting a B in. And as for Analysis...well, let's hope for a repeat miracle.

In club news: I attended all three of my clubs end of the year events last night. The start times of each worked out well enough that I could go to all three. All though by the time I reached the third one, I couldn't eat anymore ;-). The first one was the Math student vs. faculty softball game/End of the Year BBQ. There was a very good showing and the faculty even managed to field their own team and then plus some. The students still lost 10-16 but at least it was close and we were ahead at a few points. I only got to bat twice and oddly didn't see the ball often in left field which kind of sucked. I really wanted to see more action to see if I noticed a difference in my performance after taking Sports Conditioning twice a week for the past 10 weeks. Ah well. The funniest play was when Kyle was coming home and tried to slide away from Dr. Rawlings tag and Dr. Rawlings ended up falling over. I told Kyle, "Way to trip up the faculty!" hehehe. After the game, I quickly had some of the BBQ and then took off for Nucci's for NSCS' event. When I got to Nucci's I started a little concerned because I was late but I didn't see anyone there yet. So I went into the bathroom to change but when I came out, still no one but then a few minutes later they all arrived. We ended up switching locations to Village Host (which ironically was down the street from the softball game) since Nucci's didn't have enough seating. So I had pizza with NSCS. I think in the 3 years I've been in NSCS, that was the second event I've ever attended. Whoops ;-). Then I cut that a little short and went to the Methodist Church for the last Shabbat dinner with Hillel. I didn't have any food there though. But I did talk with a few people and watched all the presentation and the slide show. Then I left there and came home; it had been a long day. But as I said above, it went even longer since I was trying to fix my computer.

In personal news: My parents sold their house. Well first it was "we have an offer," then it was "we have to be out of here by June 21st and will be living in a rented one bedroom furnished apartment" and after speaking with my dad this morning it's "I'm quitting my job and we're moving to Vegas." So our weekend trip to Vegas in 3 weeks has gone from a "see the house before we move in" trip to a "come see our new house days after we move in" trip. Interesting how all that happened in a span of about 4 days. So when I move out in August, I won't be moving home but rather just in with my parents. *sigh* I'll miss you 4139.

Valencia's Notifications
Now Playing: "Mixed Up World" by Sophie Ellis Bextor on "NoAlbum"
Topic: Apartment
While I was downstairs talking with Kathryn and Julie, I glanced outside and see that across the street there's a guy with a bucket. He looked like a painter. I shift my view and see that he is a painter and he appeared to be painting some random spots. Kathryn thinks it's a primer which is probably right since he was only painting over the grey areas that were bad. But as we're watching this, we see another guy go around and put little notices on everyone's doors. He then comes across the street and starts doing ours. We pick ours up as soon as he went by. It was a notice that Valencia had hired someone to repaint the entire complex and to make sure th front side windows and doors were closed between certain hours. They said they would be painting Tuesday May 31 to Friday June 3. All the while we can see from our window a guy painting today.

(Hahaha, just detected the music. It's an appropriate title ;-) )

Roommate Aftermath
Now Playing: "Bones and Joint" by Finger 11 on "NoAlbum"
Topic: Apartment
When I went down for dinner, I was surprised to find that Kathryn had done her dishes despite us not being out of silverware. It wasn't until I went back down for my meds that I saw that she had also straightened up the shelves. That's when I figured out why: she had company. Like 3 of her friends came over and they watched a movie. I wonder if she would have done any of the counter cleaning had I not done it last night. Or perhaps if she would have had company at all had I not done it. But at least the shelves got straightened up.
****
Julie gave me Hershey's Swoops as part of an apologizing for not doing any cleaning and for not cleaning out old food from the fridge and for not fully cleaning the Forman grill. I pretty much forgave her for the grill and tried to shrug off the fridge thing but also made a point. She said she forgot about it or whatever and I said well the fridge does get crowded so it's hard to see everything that's in there.