I got bored.

You Are the Artist

You are unique and inspired. You aren't happy unless you are making art of some sort. Almost anything can be a catalyst for your creativity. You find the whole world stimulating. You have beautiful visions, and you're good at expressing them. You like people to see what you see. You also have an inventor's spirit. You're always thinking up new ideas and concepts.

What's Your Life's Mission?

Your Birthday Predicts You're Independent

Ever since you were born, you've loved doing your own thing. You enjoy puzzles and games. Anything that stretches your mind interests you. You are a quiet person - often lost in your own thoughts. Others find you completely mysterious. You have so much fun thinking, dreaming, and planing. You hardly have time for friends.

What Does Your Birthday Predict About You?

Lovely

I'm such a happy person :) I just thought I'd throw that out there. No, nothing "special" happened. It's just that sometimes I think about how terrible everything was after Mac died, and then I compare it to how I see life now. I'm a whole different person.

I guess I'll write about today.

I had a Chemistry quiz this morning. It wasn't that bad. I studied thermochemistry for hours last night so that I could remember all of the equations and how and when to use them. I think I did pretty well on it. 

My Human Animal class was pretty interesting this morning. We're talking about sex and attraction. How fun! Dr. Dolby told us today that the same areas in the brain become more active when men look at tools as when they look at a bikini-clad model :D I thought that was pretty funny, as did most everyone else in the class. I love breaking our species down until we're "just" another animal, looking at what really makes us tick. I have to get started on our next paper, and I really should start researching for our final project. 

Computer science went well too. We started learning about arrays. In order to introduce them, Stephen told us to warm up and write a Javascript program to find the mean exam scores for a class. That was easy enough. Then, he asked us to edit it so it would also count the number of students who earned scores that were at least 10 points below average. He left the room for a few minutes and came back when he'd heard a satisfactory number of frustrated groans and grumbles. He started laughing at us, informed us that what he'd just done was "mean," and then told us it wasn't possible--unless you ask the same "What is student X's grade?" bit all over again (which would irritate me, for sure), or use an array. I'd pretty much already come to the conclusion that it was impossible without some sort of new knowledge, though, and I thought it was pretty amusing. Arrays are interesting.

They had polenta with tomato sauce tonight for dinner in the dining hall. It was so good, and it was actually prepared properly. I've not yet mastered the skill of making good polenta.

I'm a Computer Science major.

Yup yup, it's true. Tomorrow I'll be a Computer Science/Latin double-major, but I'm just a Computer Science major for today.

I finally un-squicked myself and went to Stephen. I simply asked him where the department head's office is. I didn't even bother asking him a little more about the major, because I think I can handle whatever Calculus has to throw at me. Pre-Cal wasn't that bad, and I'm handling Chemistry just fine now. Stephen directed me to the Computer Science departmental lounge place that I didn't know existed and I went to see the department head in her office. 

She seemed very nice, but I was terribly nervous. She asked me a little about myself, so I told her that I'd taken two classes with Stephen and that I have (way over) the 28 credits required to declare. She surprised me by asking which professor I wanted as my advisor. I didn't know that I could pick, so I just chose Stephen. I turned in my green card to Academic Services and then trekked back down to Stephen's office. He was still there, but all of his other students had already left. I ducked inside and told him that the department head told me to give him something. He took my blue card and glanced at it, and then he started smiling. He was so excited, and so was I :) I told him I was a little worried, and he laughed at me. I told him that I'm not a brilliant math student, but he said that it would be okay. I'm happy now. 

I went to riding after I was all set, and then I had to rush to make it to my advising meeting on time. My advisor was late, though, and I sat there for about 20 minutes wondering where he was. He's lucky I'm so patient! He came running in and was glad that I stuck around, so we went into his office for a nice chat. 

We talked about how my semester has been going, and then he asked me if I've thought about possible majors. I proudly told him that I declared a major today and was planning to declare my second tomorrow. He was very curious about my decisions. I told him that I declared Computer Science today and he nodded, but his face lit up when I told him that I plan to declare Latin tomorrow. I mean, he was REALLY excited to hear that. I think he was a little disappointed when he thought that a person who came in for Classics had gone down (two flights of stairs) to Computer Science, but I'm going to have the best of both worlds :) 

I think that, if I can survive next semester, I'll make a fine Computer Science/Latin major. I want to take Calculus I this summer at the community college, and then I would like to take Calculus II and Intro to Discrete Mathematics next semester, along with a Classics course, the next Latin class in the sequence, Computer Science I, and possibly riding. 

I think I'd be an even better Computer Science major if I stopped blogging and started debugging my Javascript... 

Swimming? Eh...not quite.

I got really bored this morning. It also happened to be quite a beautiful morning. I'm pretty sure it's around 75 outside, and it's wonderful--especially since there was a massive amount of snow on the ground just a couple of days ago. 

I decided to take a shower, get dressed, and go swimming down the road at the creek. I only have access to a mucky, shallow area where the creek kind of ends, but I figured I could keep an eye out for people on their docks and work my way out to some deeper water. I walked down to the creek, rolled up my shorts, and took the "plunge." 

Agh. It was not a pretty sight. I stepped into the water and immediately sank to my knees in mud. And it wasn't just mud, either--it was decaying, nasty pond muck stuff. I did expect to sink a little, but I didn't expect to be trapped up to my knees (and, later on, to the middle of my thighs). I kind of waded around for a while. I mean, I was already covered in mud, so why not play around for a bit? It was actually fun, but it was still very cold and my joints started stiffening up. I decided to get out while I still could; the mud was making it hard to move, and my joints being stiff wasn't going to help me slog my way back to solid ground. 

I did manage to wash off most of the mucky stuff before I headed back down the road. Then, I gave myself and my shoes a good scrubbing to get the putrid slime off. I have no idea why I bothered to take a shower before I went....

I should get someone to come with me next time. I don't think Drew would even try going out in the water, even if he didn't know how muddy he'd get. Robert might give it a shot. Maybe I'll talk him into it after a nice meditation session this summer. No one else lives nearby, unfortunately.

I should write some more about other things I've been doing over break, but I'm feeling antsy.

Must love madness.

I squicked out on consulting Stephen about the major, so I'm still undeclared. Oh well. I didn't completely squick out, though. His office hours were packed on Wednesday, and he had to cancel office hours on Friday. 

Speaking of Stephen's office hours, I've already got some things planned for April 1st on campus ;) Yes, I am 19 and still celebrate the wonderful holiday that is April Fools' Day. It makes me happy, and if it's done correctly, makes other people quite happy as well. How could there be anything wrong with that? 

So... There's a GALL meeting the night before the special day, so hopefully we'll get that over with before too it gets too late. I'll still have to go out and do my things before I go to bed. I'm certain everyone else in the club enjoys the holiday at least as much as I do, so hopefully we'll plan something great--and nothing that'll detract from my personal shenanigans. 

I have lots of ideas for the general public and two specific ideas for someone whom I think will appreciate my madness. I just need a few measurements, a few more "observations," and a trip or two to the store for some supplies. 

I'm so excited, and I won't squick out! Wooooooohoooooooo!

All of this talk of practical jokes is making me think about going round and round with Drew back in high school. I also went round and round with Bunwich, but I got him a whole lot more than he got me. 

Drew loved to torment me, but he couldn't stand it when I retaliated. Shortly after we met in art class my sophomore year, he started adding dirty little pictures and phrases to my drawings. Sometimes they were easily removed or worked over, but occasionally there was one or two that were quite visible even in the finished work. He also added his own artistic flair to my own body, dumping handfuls of glitter over my head and smearing green modeling clay over my entire back. He was very upset the day I blew a palmful of glitter in his general direction, but we continued to joke around together.

Junior year consisted of mostly verbal harassment from both parties. I won't go into that very much, as I've got quite a few "dirty little secrets" that I flat-out brought upon myself...and so does Drew :) Rob will tell you all of the times Drew would run up to us as we were saying our afternoon goodbyes. Sometimes we'd do all sorts of crazy things in Rob's yard, like the time Drew demanded a ride on the back of my car. I went really slowly, truly concerned for his safety, and then slammed on my brakes as hard as possible and with no warning, which sent Drew stumbling off the back of my old Taurus and fighting for his footing. 

Senior year was when I really worked up some gall. The simplest trick I ever did was slightly moving Drew's chair from the lunch table as he sat down. He was furious as he explained that he could have been seriously injured and that I wouldn't like for him to do that to me. Meh, I wouldn't necessarily LIKE it, but I'd definitely see the humor in it (unless I threw out my hip, but that's what painkillers are for!). I didn't even attempt a full chair removal; I knew the mere thought of it would get enough of a rise out of him. 

For my birthday, Gretchen brought "lobster cupcakes." They were bright red and had whistles on top of them which we thoroughly enjoyed during our lunch period and in the time after school where we played in the parking lot each afternoon. Drew begged us for a cupcake, and immediately unwrapped it for a big bite. He was standing within my reach, so he was fair game for my tricks. I slightly tapped the bottom of the cupcake as he leaned in for a bite, and he was amazingly close to a faceful of sickeningly sweet red icing. Once again, I didn't actually want to squish cupcake all over his face. Just the thought of looking so silly was mortifying enough for him. 

The worst thing I ever did to Drew, though, was when I was chewing gum while sitting beside him. I often chew gum for stress relief purposes, so it was never abnormal for me to pop a piece of peppermint gum even at the most odd moments. I'd chew for several minutes as normal, and then I'd pretend to spit my gum into my fingers. Then, I'd press my pinched fingers toward his hair and...well, I've never seen anyone jump away from me the way he did each time I attempted this. Sure, I'd be pretty angry if someone actually put a nasty wad of gum in my hair, but pretending isn't a big deal. 

Drew continued to torment me by wasting my time, turning up my radio to ridiculously loud levels, and reaching into the driver's seat to honk my horn at other drivers at inappropriate times. Rob also did that last one on several occasions, as well as jacking up the bass and volume every time we listened to the classical station. 

If I may digress, Rob also played a very good prank on me one day at the grocery store. Whether it was premeditated or spontaneous I will never know, but I thought it was brilliant all the same. I had to pick up some distilled water one afternoon, and Rob, being a gentleman, offered to go in for me. I handed over the money and waited out in the car while he shopped, and shortly after he placed the bag into the back seat and buckled up in the front beside me. He said something along the lines of, "Okay, we can go now that we have the filtered spring water..." I was speechless because he'd so quickly forgotten the type of water I asked him to get. Then he started to laugh, reassured me that he'd gotten distilled water, and explained that he just wanted to see my reaction. It probably doesn't sound that impressive in writing, but I thought it was really funny and I completely went for it. Digression complete.

After we all graduated, we decided to go to homecoming together for a sort of alumni meeting. I allowed Drew to use window chalk on my car and...well, the results weren't all that pleasant. I also happened to have two cans of silly string in the back of my car, and Drew hijacked both of them. I managed to take back one of the cans (It was fair for him to have one!) once we arrived at the school, but Drew complained that he didn't want it on his clothes and skillfully snatched my only ammunition from my arms. Our silly string battle turned into a one-sided massacre as I took the whole of two cans. In case you didn't know, that's a WHOLE LOT of gunky string. 

I kind of feel like a jerk now that I've skimmed back over all of that stuff I did to Drew. I know I would've been able to take back anything I did to the poor kid, but I don't think he took any of it quite like I would have--even though he was much more merciless than I was when it came to dishing it out. 

Bunwich was also quite easy to get, but he took it like a real bunwich and was quite slick about returning my favors. I threw a lot of paper balls at him. I remember that very clearly. I also liked to pluck pink feathers from Mrs. Crowther's feather duster and stick them in his hair, tape them to his binder, or tuck them with his things. When he discovered them, they always ended up in my hair. One day, I started taping "LOSER" signs to his personal belongings and to his back. Eventually, he caught on and I started to find those same signs taped on my back later in the day. I tried to fill our box fan up with paper confetti once. It was mostly a fail, even though a few pieces blew out onto Bunwich as soon as he turned on the fan. Later on during that class period, I attempted to step over the fan and tripped. 

Sigh. I miss Latin and the electronic classroom... 

I have no idea where I was going with any of that. I think I was just reminiscing. If you followed me with all of that, I applaud you. Have a cupcake. (Squish.)