Today was even more interesting than yesterday; it was also a pretty
good day except for the first little while after my wipe-out.
I
woke up, played around on my computer, worked on some school work, and
then decided to take a break and run with Mom to the shoppette to pick
up milk and soda. Trunk full of 12-packs of soda, a case of bottle
water and some ice, Mom decides to take a quick detour to the Post
Office to pick up some Priority Flat-Rate boxes to fill as care packages
for my baby brother at Madison. The day is going smoothly so far; we
grab some boxes, almost get hit crossing the street to get to our car.
My mom climbs in and reaches over to unlock the passenger door. I swing
it open and lift up my foot to get in the car when my ankle gives out.
A few very long nanoseconds later, I'm on the ground and my ankle is
hurting so badly, I can't get up. I lift myself into the car with my
arms and my very concerned mother drives me home, gets me on the couch
and elevates and ices my poor ankle. After waiting a while, I call in
to work and my mom drives me to an urgent care clinic to get some
x-rays. I tore some ligament and when it went, it took a little bit of
bone with it. So, I broke my bone, but it's not actually broken. I
guess I was overdue for an injury like that. While they were fitting me
for an ugly boot, I couldn't stop laughing at the absurdity of it all:
how many people break bones climbing into a car? My guess would be not
that many. At least, not that many in their 20s.
My mobility is okay on flat surfaces, but
going up and down all those stairs at school tomorrow is going to be a
problem. I'm getting to school early, so my first class won't be too
bad since I'll have time to rest and it's on the first floor or Ching,
but after that, I have to get to the top floor of Henry (in about 10
minutes) and from there to the top floor of Ching (also in about 10
minutes). And my school is not very handicapped accessible: no
elevators for me to take and I am not standing on a little floating
platform while security runs me up and down the stairs. I'm going to be
hurting by the end of the day tomorrow. But I'll also enjoy giving a
colorful description of exactly HOW I managed to hurt myself. Because
the stories are the best part of it and I should know, I have plenty of
ridiculous stories to go with burns and sprains and broken bones and
concussions. And this one is quite ridiculous; my baby brother told me it was almost as good as the time I broke my toe answering the telephone. I really should have been named "Elizabeth Grace."
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
Monday, August 27, 2012
Last Day of Freedom
Today, I am a walking, talking contradiction. I am ready to start
class, yet not ready to deal with it all. I wanted to completely enjoy
my last day of freedom, yet couldn't resist putting an hour or so in to
stuff for school. I am looking forward to and dreading tomorrow.
I suppose it's not all that uncommon a feeling for the last day of break. I'm done lazing around, doing nothing but working at Subway and occasionally meeting up with my friends on the rare occasions our schedules didn't clash. I'm tired of spending all my time in Kapolei, doing nothing, or Aiea, working. I'm ready to spend some time in the city and not just a few hours ever couple of weeks. I'm even ready to start riding the bus again and not feel like I need to drive everywhere.
At the same time, I am not looking forward to the endless balancing act again: school-work-social life in that order. I have five 300- and 400- level classes this semester: four English and a History. That's going to be a lot of time spent out of class on reading alone, without even thinking about papers and other assignments. And then I was just promoted to Night Shift Leader at Subway, which according to my manager means basically squat in the new responsibilities area and $0.50 in the wage area. But it also means I'm going to be ending my halfhearted job hunt for something better, at least for a while. Which means I'll continue to work at somewhere that's halfway between work and school and inconvenient if I'm coming from either direction. And finally, for the first time in my life since high school, I have an active social life. I have friends and we do things like watch movies and get pedicures and go on hikes and hang out at the beach. I'm even an (honorary) auntie now to little baby Jayden (who is 8 days old today). I most certainly don't want that to suffer because that is one of the few things keeping me something that resembles sane. I had a hard enough time keeping that up this summer, though, when I was only balancing work and a life. Will it even be possible once I throw school in on top of everything else? Or will it be easier since most of my friends are college students and will therefore be cutting back on work in favor of school? Either way, I am going to have to have some amazing time-management skills if I want to get through this semester. Help?
Technically, the term started today, but since I only have classes Tuesday and Thursday, I had one more day of reedom to enjoy: so enjoy it I did. I met my friend Amy for lunch at Ala Moana and ate a huge burger. From there I rushed off to school to pick up my friend Ashley for a day of window-shopping and pedicures as a late birthday celebration. The window-shopping turned into a bit of real shopping when Ashley found a cute green pencil box in Sanrio (I've been looking for one casually for almost a month now) and I found three volumes of Cipher I needed at a Book-Off (and it was hard to tell myself know since I've been so stingy with the book money lately). And of course, I had to pay for Ashley's favorite "girl's day out" activity: the pedi. My toe-nails are now Green Bay Green in honor of the best season of the year; luckily I was wearing my I (heart) Packer Football shirt and was able to hold up the greens to pick out the best fit. Ashley's decided I am not allowed to get green or purple next time, but it's not like she has any say over what color I paint my toenails. Besides, those two colors match my wardrobe best. And finally, we finished off our day with some (overpriced) chocolate-covered strawberries from Godiva. Still, I stayed amazingly close to the budget I set for myself despite my unplanned purchases.
And then I got home and instead of enjoying my last few hours of light responsibilities, I spent probably at least an hour online, going over the syllabus and doing the first reading for my online class: Multicultural Lit. I haven't responded or done anything else, but I've thoroughly read anything I could find and participated in such mundane organizational tasks such as split the book-list into "Need Immediately" and "Can Wait on Amazon" and making a list of important dates. It was the sort of thing many would consider "busy work" but I consider essential if I want to survive this semester with even a bit of organization and efficiency. If I don't start off on the right foot, I'm doomed to always be playing catch-up. I've learned that the hard way more than once.
Another very important tool of survival I'll need is sleep. And since I now have to get up in less than 7 hours, I think it's time I ended this reflection and work on that.
Signing off!
I suppose it's not all that uncommon a feeling for the last day of break. I'm done lazing around, doing nothing but working at Subway and occasionally meeting up with my friends on the rare occasions our schedules didn't clash. I'm tired of spending all my time in Kapolei, doing nothing, or Aiea, working. I'm ready to spend some time in the city and not just a few hours ever couple of weeks. I'm even ready to start riding the bus again and not feel like I need to drive everywhere.
At the same time, I am not looking forward to the endless balancing act again: school-work-social life in that order. I have five 300- and 400- level classes this semester: four English and a History. That's going to be a lot of time spent out of class on reading alone, without even thinking about papers and other assignments. And then I was just promoted to Night Shift Leader at Subway, which according to my manager means basically squat in the new responsibilities area and $0.50 in the wage area. But it also means I'm going to be ending my halfhearted job hunt for something better, at least for a while. Which means I'll continue to work at somewhere that's halfway between work and school and inconvenient if I'm coming from either direction. And finally, for the first time in my life since high school, I have an active social life. I have friends and we do things like watch movies and get pedicures and go on hikes and hang out at the beach. I'm even an (honorary) auntie now to little baby Jayden (who is 8 days old today). I most certainly don't want that to suffer because that is one of the few things keeping me something that resembles sane. I had a hard enough time keeping that up this summer, though, when I was only balancing work and a life. Will it even be possible once I throw school in on top of everything else? Or will it be easier since most of my friends are college students and will therefore be cutting back on work in favor of school? Either way, I am going to have to have some amazing time-management skills if I want to get through this semester. Help?
Technically, the term started today, but since I only have classes Tuesday and Thursday, I had one more day of reedom to enjoy: so enjoy it I did. I met my friend Amy for lunch at Ala Moana and ate a huge burger. From there I rushed off to school to pick up my friend Ashley for a day of window-shopping and pedicures as a late birthday celebration. The window-shopping turned into a bit of real shopping when Ashley found a cute green pencil box in Sanrio (I've been looking for one casually for almost a month now) and I found three volumes of Cipher I needed at a Book-Off (and it was hard to tell myself know since I've been so stingy with the book money lately). And of course, I had to pay for Ashley's favorite "girl's day out" activity: the pedi. My toe-nails are now Green Bay Green in honor of the best season of the year; luckily I was wearing my I (heart) Packer Football shirt and was able to hold up the greens to pick out the best fit. Ashley's decided I am not allowed to get green or purple next time, but it's not like she has any say over what color I paint my toenails. Besides, those two colors match my wardrobe best. And finally, we finished off our day with some (overpriced) chocolate-covered strawberries from Godiva. Still, I stayed amazingly close to the budget I set for myself despite my unplanned purchases.
And then I got home and instead of enjoying my last few hours of light responsibilities, I spent probably at least an hour online, going over the syllabus and doing the first reading for my online class: Multicultural Lit. I haven't responded or done anything else, but I've thoroughly read anything I could find and participated in such mundane organizational tasks such as split the book-list into "Need Immediately" and "Can Wait on Amazon" and making a list of important dates. It was the sort of thing many would consider "busy work" but I consider essential if I want to survive this semester with even a bit of organization and efficiency. If I don't start off on the right foot, I'm doomed to always be playing catch-up. I've learned that the hard way more than once.
Another very important tool of survival I'll need is sleep. And since I now have to get up in less than 7 hours, I think it's time I ended this reflection and work on that.
Signing off!
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Still Kicking!
I am here! I am alive! I am typing this up on my brand-new computer!
I don't think I ever went into it here, but almost exactly 6 months ago (February 17th, to be exact), I came home from work, flipped open my computer, tried to go online and discovered that the screen was no longer working (and for all I knew, the entire computer might have been shot). I made a panicked trip to the Best Buy in Aiea as soon as they opened the next day. The service was rather horrible but eventually I learned my screen was gone and would cost $500 to repair. $500 for a piece-of-crap 5-year-old computer that should have been recalled!? Uh, no. I told the guy I could buy a new computer for that. "You could." I told him I didn't have $500 and what could I do in the meantime? I finally asked him straight-up if I could hoop it up to a monitor. "You could." And what would I use to do that? "There are cables back there somewhere." Thank you oh so much for stellar service. So for the past 6 months, my computer time has been curtailed by the necessity of having my laptop hooked up to an external monitor and the horribly uncomfortable (but totally cute) desk chair in my bedroom. Until last night. Last night, I took my meager savings and finally went to Best Buy (where I was well taken care of this time) and I bought a brand new Dell Inspiron for significantly under the $500 it would have cost me to repair my old computer. Viva Technology! My only regret is that I work tonight and therefore will have to get off my computer in three hours to start getting ready.
Now, I'm trying to get caught up on all the things I fell behind in while my computer was equal to the chair of torture. Okay, I admit, that is mostly manga...
I don't think I ever went into it here, but almost exactly 6 months ago (February 17th, to be exact), I came home from work, flipped open my computer, tried to go online and discovered that the screen was no longer working (and for all I knew, the entire computer might have been shot). I made a panicked trip to the Best Buy in Aiea as soon as they opened the next day. The service was rather horrible but eventually I learned my screen was gone and would cost $500 to repair. $500 for a piece-of-crap 5-year-old computer that should have been recalled!? Uh, no. I told the guy I could buy a new computer for that. "You could." I told him I didn't have $500 and what could I do in the meantime? I finally asked him straight-up if I could hoop it up to a monitor. "You could." And what would I use to do that? "There are cables back there somewhere." Thank you oh so much for stellar service. So for the past 6 months, my computer time has been curtailed by the necessity of having my laptop hooked up to an external monitor and the horribly uncomfortable (but totally cute) desk chair in my bedroom. Until last night. Last night, I took my meager savings and finally went to Best Buy (where I was well taken care of this time) and I bought a brand new Dell Inspiron for significantly under the $500 it would have cost me to repair my old computer. Viva Technology! My only regret is that I work tonight and therefore will have to get off my computer in three hours to start getting ready.
Now, I'm trying to get caught up on all the things I fell behind in while my computer was equal to the chair of torture. Okay, I admit, that is mostly manga...
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