The quiet things that no one ever knows.

I am finally almost done my big paper. I think it might be the best paper I have written thus far. It is definitely the paper I have spent the most time on.

Often at the end of a semester I get very sick of school. I don't want to study or write papers and so I use music to focus myself. But these times seem to coincide with times when I am sick of all the music I have. The point is that often during exams I will discover some new singer or band. I want something new and then I will find something I like and listen to it steady while I am studying and whatnot. This semester it is Brand New's Deja Entendu. I had heard a song from the album before, but I found that I pretty much love the whole thing.

This was the song that I loved the most when I listened to it the first time:

The end is near.

This is a tshirt. Isn't is awesome? Don't you want it? I do.

A lot happened this week.

I wrote my first final exam.

I wrote my last two midterms of the semester (and of my undergraduate degree). I wrote the last one today, it is quite nice to think I am done with them.

I went back to yoga after a month of slacking off. It is free yoga week at the studio I go to, so that meant there was a thousand people and the room was 100 degrees hotter than usual. It was pretty brutal, but I think I am going to try to get in as much as I can before I leave Lethbridge.

I thought that this week would be my last week of intramurals, but my thursday night team pulled it together and won tonight. That means we are in the consolation final next week.

I know I keep saying that time is going by extremely fast this semester, but it really is. I have two and half weeks of classes left. Crazy! I still have a huge paper to write though, so I can't get too excited about the end of classes. I actually have more than just that. I have the rather large Pentecostalism paper, a second submission on my Hinduism paper, a presentation on my Pentecostalism research, a monthly report for my applied study, and my applied study project to finish. So I will be busy right up to the end.

Another crazy thing is that I have started receiving PIT applications. There is still two weeks to the deadline for submission, but they are rolling already. It is crazy to think that I am actually going to have to start picking kids and planning the summer. Leading PIT this summer has been my plan for about a year, but it was always something that was quite a ways into the future, so I didn't have to think about it too much. Now it is practically here and I have to crack down. I have to focus on school for the next 3-4 weeks, but then it will be right into camp and PIT. The day I write my last exam I am expected to be at camp for a training weekend. This means I have just that day to write the exam and finish school, move out of my house (for good), and drive to the pass. No turn around time for me.

Memories like bullets they fired at me from a gun.

So I just found out that the link I have in the sidebar to my tumblr doesn't work. But don't worry, I have fixed it.

I have my first final tomorrow. It is pretty early for a final, but I like it. It will make my final exam period just a little bit less stressful.

I should be studying, but I am having a very hard time focusing.

I say this all the time, but this semester is going by so incredibly fast. I have less than a month of classes left, that is insane. I have a few large life decisions to make in the next few months. And while I am glad that my school work is almost done, I am less happy about these impending decisions. When I still had lots of school to do, I didn't have to think about them.

I have been listening to a lot of Jack's Mannequin lately. I think if I could pick one musician/artist to meet in my lifetime it would be Andrew McMahon.

Here is a nice song of his if you are interested.

This world can be ugly, but isn't it beautiful.

Today I wrote two finals. Almost back to back. I had about 2 hours between them.

It was a total of about 4 hours of constant writing. Two and a half hours on the ergonomics, and an hour an half for the religious studies. Both teachers seemed to want straight up essays and long answers the whole way.

I was feeling pretty dead and frazzled.

Then I went to Hot yoga.

And now I feel amazing!

It was so wonderful and de-stressing. I really needed it. I worked myself really hard in class and I just felt fantastic the whole time.

Some of the poses that usually kill me felt great. I pushed myself hard on everything. And at the end I felt like I could have kept going if I wanted to. Can I stress enough that I feel amazing? I am so glad I started doing yoga.

Now two more exams and then home for Christmas. Tomorrow is a study day, then I write my archaeology final on thursday. Then friday is a study day for my history final on saturday.

Grasping at pearls with my fingertips.

Here I talked about how I was starting a full week of yoga.

I have finished that full week and am in love with Hot yoga.

This studio isn't as hot as some Hot yoga, but it is still nice and warm and I sweat like a beast.

This is how the week went:

Day 1 (monday): I went to Hatha yoga in the evening. It was not a Hot class

Day 2 (tuesday): a bit sore from Hatha, but not too bad. Went to Hot yoga in the evening

Day 3 (wednesday): so sore I could hardly walk, seriously considered bailing out on yoga in the evening (there is a good chance that if I had bailed I would never have gone back), but I decided to push through. Went to Hot yoga in the evening.

Day 4 (thursday): way less sore than the day before, I felt awesome. I was stoked on life and on yoga. Went to Hot yoga in the evening.

Day 5 (friday): even less sore, felt even more awesome. Looked forward to yoga all day. Went to Hot yoga in the evening.

Day 6 (saturday): woke up early (9am is what I consider early on a saturday) in order to go to Hot yoga at 10:30am. The fact that I would wake up this early proves my growing love for yoga. I could see this saturday morning deal becoming a routine, it was actually nice to get up at a reasonable hour and do some yoga to start the day. Felt awesome for the rest of the day.

Day 7 (sunday): woke up at 10:30am to play basketball at 11am with some professors at the University. Then went to Hot yoga at 2pm. Now I am at home studying, and I feel awesome.

After only a week, I have noticed what I think are huge improvements. Not only do I no longer look like a complete douche trying to follow the flow of the movements but I have seen big improvements in my flexibility. I am normally a relatively flexible person, I have always been able to touch my toes and whatnot. But now I am bending right in half. It's crazy. Some of the postures are quite hard and I am getting stronger.

Yoga is super non-competitive. If you know me, you know that I am a crazy competitive person, so this was a bit different for me. It is all about personal gains. I am used to comparing myself to everyone around me. Take rock climbing, I am all about the comparison. Can I climb a higher grade than that person? Can I do more pull-ups than them? Can I do a harder bouldering route? But in yoga I have been forced to just compare to myself. How far can I go compared to yesterday, or last week? I think yoga will be good for me. Maybe help me get a handle on my pride (I feel like the need to compare myself to others and only feel good when I am doing better than someone else stems from a deeply imbedded pride issue).

The point of all this is that I am very glad that I tried Hot yoga out. I will be buying another week long pass for this coming week. That will take me until I go home for Christmas. Then I am planning to do yoga all next semester. Probably not everyday, maybe at first to get back into it. I think at least 3 days a week though. The studio I go to has a 21 day yoga challenge. I am thinking of trying it in the new year. Basically, you have to do yoga at least 6 days a week for 3 weeks. If you do, you get all that yoga for $60 (the one day drop in price is $15, so that is a wicked deal). But if you miss more than one day a week, the challenge is over. If you want to keep going/try again you have to pay $60 again.

I also went off sugar for a week. At first it really sucked, but now I have stopped craving sugar. I am going to try to really control my sugar intake over the holidays.

I have deleted my facebook for exam week. I am too easily distracted when I don't want to study. But I have to study, so bye bye facebook. Not that facebook is the only thing that distracts me, far from it, but it is one distraction that I can remove. Perhaps I will start blogging incessantly with facebook gone.

Winter.

It gets dark so early.

I was in the library working on one of my group projects at around 3:30.. It felt like it was about 7. It was already getting dark. By 5:05 it was dark dark. It is sad.

Now it is 6:12, and it feels like it is about 10 pm. I have to go back to the school in an hour to work on another group project.

I only have to focus for three more weeks.

Deathly Hallows.

Last night I finished watching that Harry Potter series.

The ending left me a bit unsatisfied, I am hoping the books will do a better job of tying up loose ends. But it was still a good story. The movie was sad.

Only two weeks of classes left! Then one week of exams, and then home for Christmas!

The Harry Potter books are waiting for me at my house to entertain me over the break. I am also planning to read The Hunger Games trilogy over Christmas or shortly after. I am not sure how long it will take me to get through Harry Potter, I might not get to The Hunger Games until next semester.

Control has slipped away from me again.

Well, my day off is over. I kind of took today off as well.

And I have a bunch of non-school plans tomorrow.

But I also have 4 more papers, two presentations, 4 physical activity class tests and 4 finals before this semester is over.

I counted and I have a total of 13 papers this semester. So that means I have written 9 so far, it has kind of been a crazy semester that way.

I need to get on these papers. I am having the worst time trying to pick a topic for my religious studies paper.

Sing.

I feel so free!

I finally wrote my archaeology exam.

Then I came home and did my whole basketball write up and practice plan.

And now I get to take the evening off.

I don't even know what to do with myself. I am definitely going to watch the next Harry Potter movie (Order of the Phoenix if you are wondering which one I'm on- did I mention I bought the books and have my holiday reading all planned out?). Maybe I will go to bed early, maybe I will play my guitar. I have options and it is wonderful. I am so happy that that exam is over. I have been in study mode for the last week and I am so happy for the break.

It's not hard to dream.

Last night my dreams were crowded.

I remember thinking about things like eponymous archons and Alcmaeonids.

My subconscious could not, for the life of it, remember who Miltiades was.

My consciousness however, remembered very well in the morning that Miltiades was an Athenian leader who thought that the hoplite land army, not the navy, was the key to beat the Persians in the first Persian invasion in 490 BCE. He was largely credited with the victory at the Battle of Marathon in East Attica. In 489 BCE he lead an attack against the island of Palos to punish them for siding with the Persians, which was an embarrassing defeat for him and for Athens. Miltiades was wounded and fined by the Athenian government for his failure. He died of his injuries and his son Cimon was forced to repay his debt to Athens.

My head is crowded with Greek names and dates. Too many names that are long and somewhat similar, or at least they get confused in my head. Like Aristagorus and Archilochus,  or Pesistratus, Pausanius, and Parmenides. And too many greek terms, like pentakosiomedimnoi and seisachtheia.

Athenian history is a giant web of tyrannies, archons, conspiracy, exile, conflicting political leaders, ostracism, reforms, treason, and wars.

Over my head. Part 2.

Oh hey. Hows it going?

Me? I'm okay. Just having a mild panic attack about my Archaeology exam next week. No big deal, I just feel like I'm going to barf. Gah, I have no idea how I could ever be prepared for it. I already have a paper due next tuesday that I haven't even started yet and I'm working alllll weekend and then this test is on thursday. My prof sent us out some example essay questions, and I couldn't answer a single one.

I'm so frazzled I don't even know what I should do next.

maybe cry? That usually helps, right?

On the upside, I did manage to read 135 pages of the textbook yesterday. On the downside, you'd think that would have helped me be able to answer at least one of the essay questions.... but nope.

Over my head.

So in order to catch up on readings in just one class, I have to read 201 pages by tomorrow.

Tonight it will be me and the Oxford Illustrated Prehistory of Europe.

Its not even on the cool stuff about ancient Europe. It is all stone age, Palaeolithic, Mesolithic stuff. Gahh.

I am home :)

So my exams finally ended last friday.

Then I spent Saturday moving my roommates stuff to our new place in Lethbridge.

On sunday I came home.

I spent Sunday night and all of Monday trying to get unpacked and fit everything into my room.

I did the whole get rid of ridiculous amounts of crap that have been sitting around in my room forever thing. It was quite the job.

I am not even done yet. I still have stuff to organize, a disgusting amount of laundry to do, stuff to put up on the walls, and a new shelf to build and incorporate into my room. But it will be sweet to be all done and have a nice, organized room full of stuff that I actually use.

Today I went to the States, then I went on a bit of a hike/walk. I am probably going to go on an overnight backpacking trip next week. It will be sweet, and by then I will likely have some nice trekking poles and perhaps a new backpack which is actually made for a woman and will not give me nasty hip belt blisters.

AND, good news! I got an A in my nutrition class! Definitely didn't see that one coming. That class was brutal. It was the easiest material, but the teacher had such a thick accent, you could never understand him. And his tests were never a fair representation of what he taught us, or what was in the textbook. I have no idea where he got his test questions from, but it certainly wasn't the course material. Also, a good chunk of the questions made no grammatical sense. Anyways, that class is over forever, and somehow I managed an A (seriously, I must have rocked that final).

I also got an A in my fourth year class, which I wasn't sure I was going to be able to pull off.

I am excited, I like it when I do better than I thought I would.

Now, if you want to listen to a song I recently discovered (like an hour ago) and really like so far you could listen to Konstantine by Something Corporate. It is the same lead singer as Jack's Mannequin.

Just me and Chris Carrabba.

It was nice that I actually got to start writing my exams this week.

However, it was not very awesome that at every exam I have written so far, pretty much everyone around me was writing their last exam of the semester. I am super sick of hearing,

"Oh, is this your last exam too?".

"No, its actually my first exam, thanks"

or

"Just the one this afternoon and then we're done!",

"Nope, you may be done, but I still have 2 more to write"

I feel like I have been in the library for the last month (it has been less than 2 weeks).

Today is my last day of studying, which has been a nice motivator to actually get something done. I just keep telling myself, "one more day and then you don't have to do this again for 8 months." It seems to be working. I write my last exam tomorrow morning at 9. Is it weird that I am actually a bit excited for the exam? Only cause it means I won't have to study anymore.

My roommate and I are moving to a new place. I am moving home for the summer, and she is moving now and living with a different roommate for the summer. She finished her exams over a week ago and has been packing and cleaning at our new place. Today she is moving a ton of our stuff. It has been weird having stuff slowly disappear from our house. Especially since I am not going to be living in the new house until the fall. She wants to have most of the stuff moved by tomorrow. I am not sure where I am going to live for the weekend. All of the stuff I have left here is at our current house, and I am not going to move it to the new place... but all my bedroom furniture will be at the new house after tomorrow. Hmm.

Now, back to studying. I have at least 4 more hours here in the library before I go home and study into the wee hours of the morning. This exam is going to be a beast.

ps. I you have not listened to The Shade of Poison Trees, you should! It is a wonderful album, and the song which shares the album title happens to be my favorite.

Journal articles and a lovely cover.

Remember when I whined about my final exam schedule?

If not, you can read it here.

Anyways, I am in the midst of all that loveliness.

My last day of classes was last friday. On saturday I half moved back home.

Now, I am back in Cranbrook for the week. I couldn't handle staying in Lethbridge by myself trying to study while everyone else I know is done for the summer. I know that I would just sleep all day and procrastinate.

So, here I am. Back at the college where I spent my first three years of post-secondary. Sitting in the ridiculously tiny library (I am fairly certain that my high school library may have been bigger) studying. I kind of like how big the U of L library is. One time I actually got lost in it. Not, "oh my goodness where am I? How am I going to get out of here" lost. Just, "shoot, I have no idea where I left all my stuff on this floor" lost.

I have been here since 8 am. So, about 4 hours. And, I have actually been working for a significant amount of that time. But all I have accomplished is: I have read 6 journal articles. For my fourth year class, our textbook is actually just a coursepack filled with journal articles. I was not very diligent in my readings for this class during the semester. However, I have been working to get through them the last couple weeks and I am almost done. Then I can actually start studying for that final. wahoo.

I can't wait for the evening of April 29. I will finally be done. Too bad that is so far away.

I f you are looking for a lovely cover to listen to, perhaps a Death Cab for Cutie song, may I be so bold as to suggest 'I will follow you into the dark' by Kurt Schneider.

I think it is beautiful.

This is not the video from his actual channel, because in his video he talks for about 2 minutes before the song.

The video from his channel is here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2m4eEbnR5I&feature=related

Also, if you like this cover, which you probably do, you can download it FREE!

You just have to go to his facebook or twitter.

I did.

In which I rant about the university.

well, once again, the University has screwed me over. I checked out my final exam schedule for this semester...

Just like last semester... I have pretty much the worst schedule ever.

The last day of classes is April 15th.

My roommate is done her exams on the 19th.

I don't even have a final exam until the 26th. What the heck is up with that? I have 10 days between my last day of classes and my first final. AND, I get to sit here in the stupid, windy prairies studying for exams during Easter, because, my first final is the day after the long weekend. Its like there is some sort of force that is trying to make me hate it here.

Also, my finals are within like 3-4 days. The least they could do would be spread my exams over the two weeks of exam time I have to be here. But NOPE, I get back to back exams between the 26th and 29th. I actually have one final that hasn't been scheduled yet, but my guess is, Thursday, April 28th. That is the only day between the 26th and 29th that I don't have a test yet.

Wahoo. I just love University.

Computer Science = Acronyms.

Tomorrow is my computer science final. As I was studying, I started compiling the acronyms I came across in my notes. There are quite a few it turns out. Here is a nice list of MOST of the acronyms I have to know for my final. They are all common computer acronyms, how many of these do you actually know the meaning of (without cheating)?

- CRT
- LCD
- CPU
- PC
- ROM
- RAM
- GUI
- DNS
- TCP/IP
- WAN
- LAN
- ISP
- DHCP
- URL
- HTTP
- HTML
- WWW
- ASCII
- IBM
- CE (circuit)
- ADC
- DAC
- GIF
- MP3
- MPEG
- JPEG
- OCR
- ALU
- PC (yes, there are two PCs)
- F/E cycle

Almost finals.

Right now I am way in the back of the bottom floor of the University library.

It is the "quiet study area".

I have been here since 9 am, and I have actually been studying the WHOLE TIME. Except for the last couple minutes, where I checked my email. And now I am writing this.

I have been showing biomechanics who is boss.

After our midterm, my biomechanics teacher gave us an opportunity to change the weighting of our final and midterm. We had 3 options:

1. Decrease the weight of the midterm from 25% of our final mark to 15%, and increase the final from 40% to 50%

2. Keep the midterm at 25% and the final at 40%

3. Increase the weight of the midterm to 30% and decrease the weight of the final to 35%

Now, I did quite fine on the midterm. But, I ran out of time and I didn't do one of the questions (there were 11 questions total). The teacher also told us that the final would be the equivalent of 1 and a half midterms in length, but we would get double the amount of time to complete it.

I just couldn't decide what to do. It would obviously be great to raise my mark if I could, but I didn't want to take the risk of hurting it.

Anyways, on the day we had to decide, I circled the first option and handed the paper in. I figured that I probably couldn't do worse because I would have more time.

Sooo, now I have a final worth half of my mark. The last week or two have consisted of intermittent panicking and regret of that hasty decision. However, if I study enough and do better than my midterm, it will totally be worth it.

It just means I may have to spend a few more days lost hidden here in the back of the quiet area in the bottom of the library.