Almost free!

I just submitted my math final to my professor- yesssssss. I feel so much better considering I have a monster exam tomorrow that I'm still studying for... and I require much more studying for. But at least now that's the only thing left. Man, it's weird that my first semester as a grad student is already over!

I'm feeling a bit better, I think the antibiotics are kicking in. Which is good because as much as I love sleeping 12 hours a day, it's not conducive to good studying. Or at least a lot of studying. I can honestly say I've never slept this much during a week of finals. Ever.

That's all for now, just studying and getting better, that's all I'm doing until tomorrow night when my finals are actually over. Then Keegan's company Christmas party is on Sunday, so I have that to look forward to :-D

Why do I always get sick during exams?

Since I woke up yesterday with some particularly concerning new symptoms, Keegan took me to the urgent care clinic at Duke. They did a blood test to check for mono, but when the results came back negative the PA said, "Well, that doesn't really tell us much since you've only been sick a week." Gee, thanks. So instead she says she thinks it's some sort of viral infection, which I know can't be treated with antibiotics, but she prescribes anyway on the off-chance I picked up something bacterial on top of the viral, which is why I started feeling a lot worse on Friday night than I did during the day. Fantastic.

On the plus side, I'm much more productive when I'm sick. I got up and did work for 2 hours straight and finished the updates I needed to make on this R21 for my biomaterials class. I want to have it finished today because tomorrow is when my math final is posted, so I want to just have that to focus on. That way I can finish the math by Wednesday hopefully and devote Thursday and Friday and Saturday morning completely to studying for my Tissue Engineering final. But I'm sure I won't work on the math final for that long- I think it's supposed to take 3 hours or whatever the standard exam length is. So I'm sure there will be TE studying in there too. I started studying a little bit yesterday, but then the desire to sleep took over, so I did that instead. I'd rather start feeling better sooner so my studying at the end of the week will be more high-quality.

On a cheerier note, Keegan and I put up our Christmas tree :-) It's very happy and it makes me feel better just looking at it. I can't smell it right now, which is sad, but hopefully in a few days I'll be able to. It's even got some presents under it! How exciting! Keegan's goal this year is to surprise me with his gift choices, since I was able to guess what he was giving me for Christmas the past two years. I love being surprised, but I think it must be difficult to do or something. Maybe I just need to not think about the things he knows I want and could therefore be present candidates.

We also have poinsettias that I bought from the LRHS band decorating our hearth, so they look very festive also. We have LED lights on the tree and they burn for some ridiculous 25,000 hours and use like 1.5 watts of energy, so I plan to have them on almost all the time when I'm downstairs with the tree. It will get me in the Christmas spirit. Of course I think I may have been in the Christmas spirit since Halloween when all the Christmas decorations went up... But anyway, the time between Thanksgiving and Christmas always seems to fly by, and that's certainly true this year. I can't believe it's already the 8th; I take my last exam on Saturday and by then Christmas will pretty much be on the 10 day forecast. That's how I judge when dates are close or not.

I said I would work at Target from Dec 16-19, then the 21, 22, and 23, but I haven't heard anything about if they actually scheduled me. I will be angry if they scheduled me for days when I specifically said I couldn't be there, but I don't need the job, so I'll quit if they try to make me stay on for the days I have other plans (on Dec 15 and 20). I just thought it would be nice to extend my discount and earn a little more money to put towards the wedding.

Anyway, my break is over, so I'm going to finish the final edits on that R21 and then take a shower and a nap before diving into the studying for tissue engineering.

Quick updates

-One final down, two to go. And a final project (which is about 90% finished, just waiting on professor feedback).

-Buying Christmas tree today!

-Am sick, feels like there's an elephant sitting on my chest. And like my nostrils have suddenly been removed...

-Want to start reading the Twilight series now that the movie is getting all that hype. It also makes me want to reread all my Harry Potters (which I do periodically anyway) just to remind everyone that HP will always be the man.

-Went to the LRHS Winter Concert yesterday and it was really nice to hear some Christmas music... but I think it put a serious delay on my recovery process. I felt better yesterday whereas today I feel terrible. But I'm still getting a tree, dammit.

-Started running again, feels so good to be active.

Alright, time to nap I think. Or study. Most likely nap :-)

It's that time of year

Yes folks, it's that time of year again. No, no, I'm not referring to the holiday season, oh no. What I'm referring to is much less uplifting and much more stressful. Ah yes, the dreaded exam season is upon us again. And by "us" I mean those still in their undergraduate studies and those of us wondering why we chose to sign up for another 5 years of school... Actually I'm really enjoying graduate school, I just know not to take 4 classes next semester. :-)

Yesterday something really upsetting happened. I pushed myself all of Monday to finish my last applied math homework assignment so I wouldn't have to return to campus on Tuesday for no reason other than to turn it in. And I did. I put it in the little box right after class and breathed a huge sigh of relief. No more homework assignments. Time to focus on the huge final papers and exams. But NOOOOO. I couldn't just have that moment of glory. It was snuffed out by the posting of yet another homework in my biomolecular engineering class. Which is not due until 12/12, yet our final "exam" (which is a paper) is due on 12/5. Hmmm, to me that meant I would be finished with that class on 12/5. Or actually tomorrow, since all I have left to do on the paper is straighten out my references. *Sigh* what a let-down.

I've also sent my final rough draft for my individual R21 grant proposal to Monty, so that's pretty much out of the way too. It'll probably require maybe 5 more hours of tweaking and proofing and compiling all the sections together with references, but that's not too difficult. It doesn't involve reading ridiculous numbers of papers.

I've also got a group R21 due on 12/3; I've written my section for it, so I feel pretty proud. I think that will be more difficult to compile since it's the work of 4 people being meshed together, but we did well with that on the presentation portion, so I feel confident the group will be able to organize our paper effectively. I really did get a great group to work with; I feel very blessed. That's one of the thanks I can give tomorrow! Although it's trivial in the grand scheme of things, I still think it's important. I made them goody bags to study with for finals. Which means I bought all the candy I wanted for myself, but split it with all of them so I didn't have to feel as guilty about buying $30 worth of candy. Well, maybe $20 worth of candy.

I bought a desk last weekend, which my absolutely wonderful fiance is currently assembling upstairs. What a guy :-) I helped earlier, but then I retired to work on editing my final paper for that biomolecular engineering class. It will be nice to study for finals and work on things while sitting at a desk instead of on the floor. I'm sure that will do wonders to improve my back pain!

Speaking of pain, I began running again last week. It's been so hectic at school I've really been neglecting my personal fitness. I still go to that Body Tone class, but I've only been 3 times (I had to miss it twice for meetings) and it's not really a cardio workout. It really works the muscles, but I need to do more to have a slimmer figure for the wedding. Especially since I bought a dress that fit me almost perfectly. Now I have a goal to stay the same; grad school is not really conducive to maintaining a healthy eating schedule, but I'm working on it. I think once the holidays are over it will be easier to avoid temptation and the 83478534 varieties of Hershey Kisses will not be looking at me from the shelves in Target saying "Buy me! Eat all of us!"

I want to work more on being a less competitive person. I think the person I'm most competitive with is myself, so I'm not exactly sure how that will work. I look back on my undergrad classes and my performance in my last two years and I wonder how I did it. Really 4 grad classes should not be harder than the 7 classes I had one of my semesters junior year. And I still managed to get straight As. Three As and four A+s to be exact. So what was so different? I think the whole environment of grad school is much more intense, and what I'd like to be doing is narrowing down my scope to start focusing on what I'd like to research on for my thesis. At least doing something that feels like I'm going somewhere. Now it's a lot of reading. I mean a LOT. And almost none of my readings are related to each other, but most are fascinating. I just need to get out of the competitive mindset I had in undergrad; I'm already into grad school. I already got in to every school I applied to, so why do I still feel so pressured? It's a mystery and I'm hoping I can get over it soon. I really have been doing better with homeworks and such this semester than I did in my last years at NSCU; I try not to sweat the small stuff, because once I have that Ph.D. with the words "Duke University" on it, no one will care that I got an 88 on that test or whatever, but it's a difficult adjustment from when I didn't earn a single B on any assignment in any class for years. But really I know that now no one cares what my undergrad GPA was (except maybe the folks at the NSF looking over my proposal), it's just a matter of changing my mind set. We'll see how that goes.

Tomorrow I'm going with my family (Mom, John, Kristin, and Hunter) to have Thanksgiving with John's parents near Davidson College where they live; it will be nice to see them, considering Thanksgiving is the only day of the year that I do see them. They haven't been to Raleigh since Hunter was born (in 1995) but they claim to be coming to the wedding. That would be exciting! I hope they do come since it will be a nice day to share with all of my relatives. They've known me since I was three, so to me that's essentially family I was born with. Keegan will be staying in Raleigh to have dinner with his immediate family. On Friday we're going to go over there to help them decorate their Christmas tree! We're going to be buying our own and setting it up next weekend after I've had my first exam. I think that will be a nice treat for me :-) For both of us, actually!

It's less than a month until Christmas and less than 7 months until the wedding! 206 days according to our TheKnot website. Yay! Hmm, still so much to do... Cait and Sara (?) and I will be going on in a few weeks to finalize their dresses and look at possible flowers. I think those are the biggest things left to do. And they have been for awhile. I seem to get things accomplished in spurts where I order a cake, book a photographer, then buy a wedding dress then to nothing for 6 weeks. You know. In all fairness, I have found some wedding invites online that I really like, and I've been looking at bouquets and flowers too. But it's been too crazy to really get much done.

Well, I should go help Keegan now that I've finished my editing. Then we're going to watch the Charlie Brown Thanksgiving special because I'm a nerd.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! Remember to be thankful for what you have, rather than dwelling on what you don't. I know I will be counting all my blessings and being thankful for each in turn.
:-)

Looking to 2012

Unfortunately this election year, I think it's the true American people who lost out. Majorly. While I still don't feel that either party produced a candidate I could whole-heartedly support, at least I know I cast my ballot for the lesser of two evils, so to speak. I believe that a President McCain would have unified the country more than Obama ever will, because I know I personally will never call Obama my president. This election was so polarizing in so many ways, and I think that John McCain tried to paint himself as more conservative than he really is, and maybe if he hadn't done that, he would have been able to pull more support.

I think this country needs a more moderate president, which I believe is what President Bush has tried to be, trying to appeal to both parties to please everyone, but his attempts have been met with nothing but stubborness and unwillingness to compromise from both parties. And since control of Congress was lost to the Dark Side in 2006, nothing has been achieved. Basically two years of no growth, no nothing. It is interesting to note, however, that the Congress's approval rating is even LOWER than that of President Bush; this should tell you something about how the liberal ideals actually translate to the real world where we all live, and that's not good. Which us smart folks knew from the beginning ;-)

When I think of the respect America used to command, I am extremely saddened and disappointed by the opinion which most of the world holds for us. And we deserve it. We spend too much time policing the world and not enough time focusing on improvements that need to be made at home. The United States used to be the most powerful country in the world, and now we're crumbling. I mean obviously people still want to come here, as evidenced by the great number of illegal immigrants filling our country and living off our welfare system without paying taxes. But we should be, and could be, so much better, so much more.

In some ways I realize that Obama being elected might be the best thing to happen to the Republican party since Ronald Reagan. The most liberal senator, who served only a 140 something days actually IN session with the Senate, is now going to be in control of our country. How could this have happened? How could someone with no experience be asked to give advice based on it? How could someone who's never respected this country enough to serve her be put in charge of the most powerful army in the world? How could a socialist be elected to lead a country whose very foundations are based on the freedoms to work for yourself to make your own life and to do it your own way? Why should my hardwork turn in to someone else's pay off? I feel like in 4 years this country might be in so much trouble there won't be any way to save it. And this will hopefully awaken the other 51% of voters to the horrible mistake they just made.

I think this happened because no one knows what he stands for other than vague ideas of hope and change that don't translate to anything but B.S. I do believe that after he's finished taxing the American people, some of them will have nothing but change left (har har). I do believe he's not someone to be trusted. I know that most people, if they knew what he stood for and believed personally, would be appalled. The abortion of children into the third trimester? Complete redistribution of wealth? Severe gun control? Where are these things included in what this nation was founded on?

I am reminded from this quote from Atlas Shrugged, an amazing book that everyone should read:

"Do you wish to know whether that day is coming? Watch money. Money is the barometer of a society's virtue. When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion-- when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who deal, not in goods, but in favors-- when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don't protect you against them, but protect them against you-- when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice-- you may know your society is doomed."
(Ayn Rand)

This is exactly what I see in the results of this election. I'm so disappointed that what should be some of the best years of my life are being marred by this horrible mistake, which is what I might start referring to him as. Just "Mistake". Or "Socialist". Or "Dumbass". All fit nicely.

Well, on some lighter notes, there are 15 school days until graduate classes end, and only on 10 of them do I actually have class :o) Too bad I keep realizing all the work I have left to finish before Christmas. I have a huge presentation today actually, that I think will be killer. Our professor was really harsh on the people that already presented; he told me, however, that my topic is one of the hardest ones, so maybe he will be nicer to me. Doubtful, but who knows.

My dad is coming this weekend, so he's going to get to see my dress :o) And Cait and Sara are going to be there too, looking at styles of bridesmaid dresses, since we need to get on ordering those. Oh goodness, with all the stress of school, the wedding planning takes a backseat. But luckily the spring semester shouldn't be as rough.

Anyway, I have some reading to do before I shower and head to school. I'm sure I'll post more later, maybe next month :-P

Looking to spring

Well look at that, I'm breaking my record for posts in a month :o)

I registered for Spring 2009 classes this morning, and thankfully I'm only going to be taking 3, because 4 is killer (and 2 is full time). So no more 4 classes for me :-D

I'm going to be taking Drug Delivery, some sort of intro to cell biology class, and something with the words "transport phenomena" in the name. And the BME seminar that doesn't count for anything, but I have to take it. But I think the cell bio class is only 1/2 a semester, yahoo! So no class on Friday for part of the semester.

Anyway, I have a group meeting in 10 minutes I have to get to (gotta develop that neural tissue engineering method!) and then I'm going to the body tone class with Emily again. But I'm going to try to run before it since I didn't go to the gym this morning- I registered for classes instead. Then I think tonight Keegan and I will carve our pumpkin!!
:-D

Oh, and I got to have lunch with Amy today; that was nice :o) It's so good to see old friends you haven't seen in awhile!

The amazing exponential workload

So it's actually been one month since my last post, and I'm killing a little bit of time before going to a gym class with Emily, so I thought I'd post a short something.

I bought my wedding dress! Last weekend with Cait, and it's beautiful and unique and I'm so happy (but I can't go in to more detail because Keegan reads this blog!) to have found it. It was also "last season" and off-the-rack, which made it about 60% off and in my price range, so that was pretty exciting. As if the dress wasn't "me" enough, the fact that it was super on sale definitely makes it me :o)

I guess the last big things to tackle on that front are getting the bridesmaid dresses in order, picking a menu for our reception, and picking flowers. I hope to get all of those things done before Christmas, but I've got vague ideas for each of them. Then over the break and into January and February I can get smaller things finished, like ordering invitations and making a hair appointment or whatever. I'm sure there are many other things I'm forgetting though...

On the school front I'm slowly being squashed by my workload. The end of the semester is approaching, so that means we've reached the project season. I'm working in a group to develop a method to engineer nerves and then writing an R21 grant proposal on that, I'm working on my own to present and write a paper about unnatural amino acid incorporation into proteins and the genetic code, I'm writing an individual R21 proposal on an unrelated topic for my biomaterials class, and I'm trying to work on the NSF Fellowship application as well. That's on top of the usual load of math homework, biomaterials readings, tissue engineering homeworks, biomolecular engineering homeworks, and monster lab reports. I get so excited when I realize the end of the semester is approaching, then I remember all this stuff has to get crammed in to all that time somehow :-o

I guess there's not too much new to report... just doing school work and that's about it. With some minimal wedding things thrown in there too. I supposedly have a midterm in my applied math for engineers class, but he hasn't posted it yet, even though he was going to about 2 weeks ago. Then he decided he'd post it Wednesday... well, it's Thursday late afternoon and still no midterm. I hope he just waits until tomorrow to post it so that way I can have a night where I just have to do a whole crapload of reading instead of working on homeworks and getting up at 5a.m. And then I can go running in the morning :o) I've only been twice this week and I like to go every day. That's my time so I don't go insane... but somehow I'm still going insane, little by little. But at least I'm getting my exercise. And the dress I bought fit me almost perfectly, it just needs to be taken in a little, so that's my incentive to stay the same weight to I won't have to do major alterations.

Anyway, it's time for the weight-lifting fitness class that I forgot the name of, so I guess I should pack up my stuff :o)