it's all new

Man, new semester. So exhausting. But I'm glad. Because as much as I love break, and would love to sleep in until noon everyday and not have to worry about much the rest of the day, there's something exhilarating about having accomplished something.

This week has been crazy so far, but I don't think necessarily in a bad way.

• I tried sushi . Also Dr. Pepper. And saw Garfield and Friends. And Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure. All for the first time. Okay, so I might be getting started late on all those "essential life experiences," but at least I'm getting them in, right?
• I accidentally signed up for technical writing (a class for mainly chem and biochem majors, from what I can tell) instead of technical communication... Showed up to class to class full of seniors and super seniors, and let's just say I felt a little bit out of place.
• I'm taking an honors art history class... I can't say that I feel super comfortable there either. 
• Tonight I made banana oil in my o chem lab! I realize that I only signed up for 1 credit (which would means I only take it for half the semester), but I'm already kind of attached to that class, even though it is late at night. 

Hahahaha if only I had a phone like that....

• Tomorrow marks the day of my first scuba diving class. Words cannot tell you how excited I am. This class will make Fridays just that much more sweet. (You might not be surprised that I made the decision to take a Friday night class based on the assumption that I was going to have no social life this semester...).
• Last Sunday I made fudge! I think there's still some left, but I'm too lazy to go take a picture. Sorry guys. But the reason for that is that every year around Christmas my mom made fudge. This year, she didn't, and I didn't get around to it either while I was home. So I decided that I couldn't let that tradition die. And besides, fudge is delicious, and not all that difficult to make.
• OH! Also I played on not one, but five real pipe organs yesterday! Ah, so happy! Also two clavichords but those aren't nearly as fun. Playing a real organ makes me feel so powerful. It's wonderful. 
• Just as kind of a side note, not having 8 o'clock classes makes such a difference.

I've been thinking lately about what I want to do this summer. I applied to a couple of internships, and hopefully I'll apply to a couple more this weekend. But I'm not sure if that's what I want to do... I want to go and see places, and do things, and I feel like this is my one chance while I'm still in college. Before my sister got married, we always planned on backpacking Europe, and now I want to go but I have no one to go with. Sad day. 

finding energy

I feel like I'm not doing enough; that I'm just going through the motions and not going anywhere. Before I went to college what I wanted to do in general was pretty clear, but now I'm stuck up on all the nit-picky things and I don't know what specifically is best for me right now, and what the best ways for me to spend my time are. I want to join clubs, to find an internship, to do all of these things that I know I'll enjoy and be glad I did later, but I can't seem to be able to overcome that energy barrier of starting, of taking the time to look for internships and fill out the applications; to find out what clubs there are and figure out how to join, etc., etc.

But this is not just a concerted reaction (aka it happens all in one step), where once I overcome that initial energy barrier it's all downhill, I continually have to input energy to do the things that I think will be worthwhile, and so I don't think I can say that I've done all I've wanted to so far this year.

Probably have been doing too much chemistry lately...

I guess what I'm saying, is that lately I've been having a tough time motivating myself to do everything I need to do, and then everything I want to do. And then, sometimes, I'm simply not even sure what I do want.

BUT, on a bright side, tomorrow is Friday, and then the next week is Thanksgiving! I am so excited to have some time off of school. Other than weekends the last day off from school was Memorial day. Needless to say, I think I could benefit from a break.

oh glorious day

I just want to start off by saying that this week (so far) has been way less stressful than I was expecting it to be. I took two tests today, and I got a brownie after the first one! Also my organic chemistry test was... easier than my Book of Mormon test! I might actually have to start transferring some of the effort I spend in organic chemistry to other classes (such as everything other than organic chemistry basically...).

I don't really have anything else to say, so I will post some pictures from France!

Eiffel tower at night = gorgeous

Creeper picture! Thus, no head. It's funny,
you won't really find people wearing shorts in France...

I kinda really, really want to play a  real pipe organ.
 Especially one like this.

   

just when I became a hexagon pro...

Orgo started moving really fast all of a sudden. I thought I had a pretty good handle of the material; after all, I was drawing hexagons like a pro! Only to learn that cyclohexanes aren't actually shaped like hexagons (I'll add pictures tomorrow...). Can you imagine my chagrin (hehe I can pretend that I'm a English-minded person) when I discovered that all this time that they had me drawing hexagon after hexagon, they aren't even hexagons? They're actually chair shaped, but they can turn into a boat, but because the boat isn't very stable, cyclohexanes usually switch between two chair conformations. But if they have constituents on the ring, they can actually have isomers, and then switch between the two, and it's all very confusing, as you might have guessed. 

This makes me happy, because I can draw hexagons really, really well

This does not. Chairs and boats are rather confusing. Thank you, chemistry

   
In someway I kind of feel betrayed. I mean, I've known for long enough that for every rule there are exceptions, and then exceptions to the exceptions, but really. Orgo has a way of crushing everything I learned in AP chemistry. Example: methane isn't an acid! Except for it can be. Never mind that the pKa is around 50 (aka it will almost never act as an acid), but it could potentially act as an acid. This phenomena is not unique to chemistry: it also happens in physics, and probably elsewhere too. It's all a big game, trying to figure out what is actually the reality of things (while not being overwhelmed with information).

Speaking of games... I played the career fair game today, even though as a freshman my chances of getting an internship (particularly through a career fair) are pretty slim. I got all dressed up with my sister's pencil skirt that had poor consequences for my shins (and severely restricts the stride of my legs. I will trade for a tie any day), printed out eight resumes, and gave out seven. It was... a little bit intimidating, since most everyone else had a good two or three years of schooling on me, and I don't have any standout experience yet. However, I did receive some lovely free stuff...

I also got a shoulder bag, which I probably will never use...

cutting corners

I have a really bad habit of cutting corners all the time. Since I live decently far off campus, every time I go onto campus I envision the point from where I am to campus as a straight line, and then I adjust for cars, roads, buildings, and sometimes people. But I don't just strive the most direct path, I adjust to create the most efficient path, taking into account the energy that each path will require to expend, and time.

I guess the rest of campus concurs with me... My apologies, BYU grass

Good for you, you might say. Except for maybe not so much, because sometimes my tendency to cut corners extends beyond trampling the grass, or partially jay walking from crossing the street at a slant. For example, in my Book of Mormon class we have to read the first half of the book in two weeks, and our professor said the chapter headings weren't technically part of the text... so I haven't read any of them. And then in all my classes I can never seem to do any of the homework before the night it's due, or sometimes even the day of, if it's something that doesn't have to be handed in during the class period. And my food? Yeah, definitely not up to snuff. I really do need to do better to stay on top of things... and to do them the right way, not just half-way or part way. 

Also, my habit of calculating the possible benefits and detriments to each path has led me to the realization that to every situation there are way more factors than you can see at the initial glance. Sticking with the example of getting to point A to point B in the most efficient manner, one might decide to cut through the grass, because the distance that way is shortest. But is it the most effective path? Because after all, the grass offers much more resistance than the sidewalk does, so it probably takes longer and requires more energy. And there's always the risk that the sprinklers were just on so you might slip or at the very least your new shoes will get soaked. So really, is it worth it? I don't know. Honestly, I'd probably be better off walking to campus like a regular person. 

On a somewhat unrelated note, my organic chemistry class (so far) is awesome. My professor is absolutely obsessed with explosions and I love it. Every class period we usually get at least two explosions, although this time it was something cooler... the reaction of sulfuric acid and sugar. Watch the last minute or so of this video. The smoke you see coming off is carbon dioxide. Chemistry is so neat!

school at long last

I've been putting off posting on here, because although so much has happened, I'm not really sure how I feel about everything yet, but I suppose close to 1am would be a good time for a blog post (college does crazy things to your sleep schedule).

Orientation last week was tons of fun, and I met lots of people (the majority of whom I don't remember names of now), but to be quite honest it was a little bit overwhelming, and it made me anxious because all of the things that will probably be routine for me in a month or so were foreign and unknown, and without classes starting I couldn't exactly determine where my favorite places to think/people watch/study and so forth were to be.

Classes started this past Monday, and I was really grateful for that. Nothing like classes starting to help you get in the swing of things. Other than the class change in between statistics and freshman writing (it's a mad house getting out of the JKB... Wednesday I was stuck trying to get out of the building for at least seven minutes, and then I had to move myself allllll the way across campus to the Maeser building. In three minutes. It didn't really work out. Perhaps I should have tested out Rachel's philosophy from The Poisonwood Bible; just stick out your elbows and float along with the crowd. Maybe I'm too short for that, I don't know.), I really like my schedule (although maybe not the fact that my organ class is at 8am. That is somewhat unfortunate). None of my classes seem like they are going to be terribly difficult, and I'm particularly excited for organic chemistry (which I'm sure you'd be able to tell from the way that my knee always bounces when I sit down for class, and how I haven't introduced myself to anyone, and how I take the most scrupulous notes in the history of man...) because my teacher is somewhat obsessed with fire, and we always have at least two demos (involving fire) every class period. Chemistry is so cool!

I've learned a lot this past week, at least from the college life perspective. I learned how to use the washers and dryers (they take foreverrrr), how to use my ID card, and what it can be used for, how to print stuff out, how to make friends (okay fine, still working on that), how to find my way around, how to use practice rooms for piano, how to check stuff out of the library... I of course had to find the science section and get the nerdiest books. I also bought some pretty nerdy books that were on sale at the bookstore, so I guess now is just the challenge to be able to find time to read all of them.

I don't know when I discovered that physics was super cool and became enamorated with it, but I really do enjoy reading books about the universe and so forth, although I wouldn't ever switch to become a physics major. Maybe I'll minor in astronomy...

waiting...

I've been thinking about creating a blog for a while now, but to use a bad chemistry metaphor, the activation energy for this project was too high to overcome without some enzyme assistance, aka the pressure of a clock ticking down the days until I go to college. There are only ten left. Days until I leave, that is.

To be quite honest, I haven't really thought through this whole my-life-is-going-to-drastically-change-really-soon thing in all that much detail. I know I'm going to take awesome classes and be far, far away from all the people I've been friends with all through high school, but I'm sure the reality of it will still come as a shock. Perhaps this summer has been a little too intense for inward inflection, between travelling, juggling Dunkin' Donuts and work for my dad and then finding time to hang out with friends for this last summer before college (which, I might add, is free of summer homework, hurrah!). Sometimes life just has to drag us along and hope we catch on eventually.

Paradoxically, despite all that I still have left to do, I feel like I did at the beginning of this summer - stuck between two stages of my life, where only time will remedy my straddling position. And thus I am left to wait, no longer a senior and not yet a freshman.