Happy Saturday

I'm sitting here staring at the laptop screen. Sunshine is pouring in, I have the window open, my new scarf is wound around my neck, and I'm just staring at the screen. Today is the Saturday after Thanksgiving -- precisely two days before the last week of this semester begins. I have so much left to do, you would not believe it.

I made the mistake of choosing to play first, work later, of course, because now I cannot play and when I do, I feel guilty and the thought of the work lurks at the back of my mind. I need to sit down and make a list of things I need to do and their due dates, so I check them off as I finish them one by one.

But... more than anything, I want to be at my mom's house, playing Sims and watching HGTV.

More than anything. Le sigh -- just remember, one more school week. This is one last week of stressing the shit out of myself, then five weeks off before the second semester. That's it, words of encouragement -- words of hope, Robert.

Walking on Heavy Air

I dreamed I was hearing, so I was, well, HEARING stuff and talking, but I can't really remember what happened. I woke up still thinking I could hear and didn't recognize my alarm going off. There was a pulsing vibration shaking my bed, and I was freaking out.

"Turn it off! How the hell do I turn it off?!"

I succeeded in turning it off, slept 30 minutes more, and ended up running my oily self into class. A certain professor wasn't in today so that made my day a bit better, and I got coffee, my secret lover and public drug, and quit the Honors program. That might cost me a couple of thousands in my education, but I don't care. I don't enjoy being in the shit they call the Honors Program in such an elite jackassed way.

I'm cranky.

I also finished a literature review last night that was due about, ah, two weeks ago. What else? I finally stayed on campus this past weekend, didn't see Dave, and ended up drinking in my room anyway. Alcohol can have such an interesting influence on you and your friends' relationship. My roommate is also still new to this drinking thing, so I am trying to corrupt teach him how to deal with drinking.

This entry had no structure or point. Like life.

I have been feeling emo lately (Oh, how I detest that word) and now I feel like lying in bed, drinking absurd quantities of coffee and reading all the books I bought the last 5 years without ever reading them.

I also want to become a linguist so I can stay at home and write and take care of children and wipe up dog doo. Is that a silly dream to have? Are dreams silly at all, if they suddenly come to us? Are dreams our subconscious' way of telling us that we're not happy with the way our life is going?

We'll know in due time, kids.

Midterms Misery

Two words:

Fuck you, midterms. Well, that's three words, but frankly, I don't care. The midterms were surprisingly easy, I'm just irked that I still have so much to do right on the top of the midterms that they get thrown down the list of priorities! Now that I have my projects left to do... it's almost 8pm on Thursday night and I haven't really started on them either. Sims really took over my soul, especially since I got this brand new expansion called Apartment Life.

I mean, seriously. APARTMENT. LIFE.

And I'd find any way to procrastinate too. I'm relapsing into the first semester, fuck. I'll have to tread carefully or I'll drown once again, and that was NOT fun at all. I just need to finish everything tonight because I'm going to the mountains this weekend and I won't have the internet. I'm skipping my last class tomorrow because the amtrak leaves only at one certain time. Skipping my first class this Monday as well -- I'm going to spend the day with Dave. :) so I'm doing the workload that's due tomorrow and Monday.

Thank god for coffee. I'm drinking decaf right now, though.

Okay, okay, I'm going to start my shit now.

Back from the Dead

So, children, it has been almost two months since I've done an update. Sorry! A lot has happened, and it's a lazy Saturday early afternoon, so I thought I'd make a proper entry and let you into what's happened lately.

The classes has been surprisingly easy on me so far. I started this semester thinking, "Oh god, this is going to KILL me." and now I'm shocked that I have free time. Sometimes it feels like a dream and I wonder when I'm gonna wake up and find all the due dates are today, or something equally horrible. I'm using this time to go off-campus and explore DC and everything. Classes, plus going off-campus, plus mini-shopping sprees, and there's also long-term projects and friends to see -- and add a man to the mix, and I've got a life! The next weekend I'm to go to the mountains, home, in Virginia. I have the need to be by myself and away from civilization -- what best way to do but go to the mountains in the middle of nowhere? No internet, no cell phone signal, few people, and nature all around you?!

Drama in that department ("love," dating, relationships) in other people has been going around like flies on garbage here as well. Love triangles, cheating partners, and crushes on impossible people are more than abundant here, so it's funny to sit back and watch it all. Freshmen all around me are fucking one other and talking crap behind their backs, some sort of a trend with this year's froshies! My frosh year, I was single and didn't have one single experience, be it sexual or anything else, with anybody, and the rest of us 2011ers were already a couple from before. Now this year's freshman class is full of single horndogs. Funny to compare!

My classes. Well, let's see -- my GSR class has been easy so far, except for the quizzes. We have three books to read and I do my reading homework, I swear! ...Except for this one atrocious book, "Food Politics" it's a sucky reading! So I avoid it and accept when I fail my quizzes. The labs on Fridays has been fun, though. There is this one person who misses all the important things in class and later texts me asking what she has missed. I tell her to ask the professors -- I don't really give a tiny rat's ass either. You're on your own here, doll :)

The rest of my classes are pretty easy. I'm enjoying my creative writing class, where all I do is write and write, and the professor don't actually check our work. I could bring in my paper that I wrote during my sophomore year in high school and she'd check it as homework handed in, but I don't! I wish I felt the same way with my Intro to Edu class, because I'm beginning to just... not like it. Maybe it's because of the professor's lack of... reasonable teaching skills, or the other people's rude stupidity, or just the class itself. I'm not enjoying it. For linguistics, I like it but it's really easy so far. ASL has been really exciting too.

I have a semester-long project for ASL, too, and I'm to compare the song by Marilyn Manson, "This Is The New Shit" in English lyrics and the video of the song in ASL. It should be really fun and challenging! I haven't really had any problems with my professors, either. It's funny because everybody else complains about them. It's not the professors' fault when you're too stupid or narrow-minded to understand them :)

I've also noticed a change in my disposition. I've just stopped taking shit from people, and I tell them what's on my mind. It's pretty scary, when you reflect on how I used to be back in high, or middle, school. Some people have dubbed me as a bitch, but I've gotten tired of arguing with people and taking their negative energy into my stomach. I must say, it's gotten me on a positive side of my life!

My arms are sore! This entry will do for now! I promise I'll make another update less than two months :)

Classes

When you're a second-year student at Gallaudet, you know they always do a shit-job of the whole work in registering for classes, contacting advisers/professors/whoever, letting you know the pre-requirements, and so forth on.

It took me the whole summer to finally get off my butt and register for classes. I had registered half of it already, but the system was all jumbled up. Gallaudet has a new minor, in Linguistics, and I was waiting for that to get into the system. After almost two months, I finally logged into my Gally account and found that they changed the whole layout. It's somewhat better, but too much clicks to get to what I want.

Nonetheless, I got my classes signed up. The times are really dumb, but I didn't have any other choice. Too much conflicts, and some I couldn't change because it had only one time slot. So without further ado, here's my Fall 2008 schedule. P.S. TT means Tuesday and Thursday.

EDU 250 - Introduction to Education. MW, 3-4:20pm Self-explanatory. I'm just taking this to see if I will really want to teach. It's a late afternoon class. Those are unavoidable. Damn it. Ibuprofen will become my new best friend... again.

ASL 301 - ASL & English: Comparative Analysis. TT, 9:30-10:50am This one will be different. The past ASL classes has been pretty much superficial, touching the surfaces of many various topics. I'm hoping that it's going to be a lot more entertaining, too, that taking notes will be worthwhile!

LIN 301 - Introduction to Phonology and Morphology. TT, 1-2:20pm This is my most exciting class -- in my opinion, and even though I haven't even taken it yet. I enjoyed my linguistics class so much, I was thrilled when it came out as a minor so I grabbed this when it came up. Phonology AND morphology in one! It's gonna be such an orgasm for my eyes and hands.

ENG 392 - Creative Writing. MWF, 11-11:50am This one is self-explanatory, too. The topic hasn't been announced, but I probably got an email on it already then forgot about it. Oh well. I'm looking forward to it!

GSR 230 - Scientific and Quantitative Reasoning. MWF, 8-9:50am. The topic is "The American Diet" I think this will be the one class that will make me want to dig pins into my eyes. But this was the last class I picked, and I had a lot of different topics and times to pick from, but none fit my schedule. And apparently this has lab. Whatever lab is, it doesn't sound so good.

So there you have it. Some I'm excited for, some I'm just dreading for. Win some, lose some! Mondays and Wednesdays will be my excruciatingly busy days (embellishing, me? Never.) and then there's that 8am class. I'm guessing that it's a colorful way of telling me that I have to grow up. Okay then!

Roomzillas

So! I thought it was time for a new post. What other might I talk about that's related to college while I'm still on my summer vacation? Roommates!

I have never experienced the sole, well, experience, of living with somebody else, much less in the same room. It wasn't the same as spending a week at the dorm at VSDB. It wasn't like living with my parents at all. Bear in mind, I'd been lamenting about the hell I was going through from living with my father (that's a whole 'nother post) after my mother finally left him. I was still incredibly close to my mother and sick of my father, so coming to Gallaudet to be on my own was a momentary blessing.


At first my assigned roommate was somebody that I knew and simply did not want to live with (he was actually the one who told me and asked to change roomies) so I asked for a reassignment. I got paired up with a guy whose name seem familiar. I went around and dug up dirt on him. We'd met him on the Academic Bowl sometime ago. West Virginia. Football player. All-around asshole. Was this somebody that I'd want to live with, especially given the fact that I was a bubbly, unpredictable gay guy? So of course, I worried and laboured over that for several weeks before finally going to Gally. He never showed up. I had the whole room to myself. I asked around, and found out he just wasn't coming at all. Ye-es!

But of course, there was a time early in the first semester where people could move around and pick people they'd prefer over their current roomies. My best friend Elisy was stuck with a girl who was obsessed with her friends from a faraway state, of whom Elisy knew nothing about. Another friend was stuck with somebody who didn't shower, pick up their dirty clothes, and just stunk. Remember that guy who bluntly told me he didn't want to be roomies with me? He got stuck with this excessively irritating guy who wouldn't shut up. So that day was an opportunity for them to change around and live with somebody they wanted to, but I couldn't live by myself. Stupid rules. I was evidently put together with this guy whose roommate never showed up either, Gabriel Pasnam.

He was an absolute pussy. I say that with love, but at that time he was meek and terrified of me. I went out of my way to be nice to him, but of course he got on my nerves with his constant and profuse apologies, his paranoia, and his naivety. He was known as Gaby and famous for his apple-red cheeks and incredible shyness.

One night I was sleeping by some miracle, when somebody grabbed my shoulder and pulled me from sleep. It was one of the resident adviser and the fire alarm was going off, blinding me. I was confused, then surprised to find my roommate Gaby gone. I left the dorm and forgot my key to the room, so I found Gaby to follow him back into our room.

"Hi, I forgot my key," I said.
"I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry," he trembled.
"Calm down, okay, where were you?"
"I didn't want to wake you up!" he clamored.
"What? Why?" I was in disbelief.
"I didn't want to make you mad!"

Here I was living with somebody who would soon leave me to burn to a crisp than wake me up if there was going to be a fire. Somebody who fell to their knees every time I came into the room. Somebody who had to ask me for permission on everything. I had had enough and next the few days I was just trying to avoid him. I finally asked him after I've calmed down reasonably enough.

It was because of how I always seem angry. He's also hard of hearing and new to the whole signing and the deaf culture, so I didn't blame him. I'm keen at being expressive with my face, so to him that seem like I was always pissed about something. After winter break, everything seem to improve, from the layout of our room to our relationship. It went from a hospital room to a typical guy dorm room, and it went from scared shit v.s. insufferably annoyed to pleasant, normal roommates -- respectively.

I'm like a big brother to him who lets him in the whole corrupted world about girls, sex, alcohol, the dirt on other people, and whatnot. Gaby is really a good person, and I'm happy to be roomed with him -- I mean, compared to all those other guys. We're rooming again this fall at Benson Hall! I was just lucky to have a good roommate from the start -- well, from the delayed start anyway.

College Travellings!

One way or another, it's true in every case: being in College makes you travel! You just somehow end up travelling -- spring break to some exotic country with friends, studying aboard in France, or being sent to a foreign University to visit! It doesn't matter if you grew up with parents or other relatives who always took you to the corners of the world, or when an exciting trip meant a car ride to Wal-Mart, being a college student always makes you travel, and I'm happy to say so.

I was born into a lower middle-class family in Virginia (hillbillies, anybody?) and we were NOT rednecks because we always kept the discarded kitchen appliances and vehicles out front of our houses sparkling clean. So anyway, even though we didn't have all the money and anything that we desired in the world, we got by -- and I was spoiled rotten. Actually, that probably was why we were poor. So all my other classmates would show off about going to some far state and visit their aunt or uncle or grandparents. I never had that opportunity, everyone in my family lived 2 hours away or less, all in the same state. One exception was Mom's cousin, in rural West Virginia. It was a lovely place, but to a little boy, it was boring. No cable -- no captioning for movies, no video games.

When I was in middle and high school, I abhorred hearing about other people's summer or winter breaks. I was jealous about them going to some European country, or Disneyland, or just California. Even VA beach pressed my buttons. I went on a family trip which reached Tennessee, Kentucky, and North Carolina, but I was nine. VA beach was fun, but it still hurt to hear about it from somebody else because they had fun going with their friends and I didn't with my mother and her adult friend.

VSDB has Academic Bowl, and we went to West Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania. Of course, that was still not enough because we went to those places to work and to think and to not have fun. I mean -- it's not like I did NOT have fun, so cool it RJ :)

When I got accepted to Gally, I knew I had to just do something and get out and do something different. I had to be one of the many others who said they did all those awesome things during the summer and some other breaks. So I did. It didn't happen until the second semester, anyway -- most particularly when I stopped spending money on compulsive DVD-shopping. And so now I'm in Minnesota!!

I've been here for two weeks now, and I fly home tomorrow. I'm gonna miss Elisy, whom I've been staying with, but I'll see her again when classes at Gally start up again. RJ dropped me off at the airport two weeks ago -- funny, it doesn't seem that long ago! Mom and Granny are picking me up tomorrow at the airport, so that means a nice dinner out! I've already made plans when I get back :) particularly helping RJ out with her summer cleaning and a platonic date with, oh my, a boy!!

Before I forgot, I went to Ocean City, Maryland, for my 21st birthday. I'll be flying to Arizona for a friend's wedding next month. It's a great feeling finally going out and doing things on my own terms! :) Yay for college!

Hair-raising Entry!

Even though I've only been at Gally for nine months, it's still hilarious to see how much my hair changed.

The first semester I had to take ASL, then the second semester I took deaf studies. In both classes I was required to do vlogs -- video blogs, you see. I was gonna put in entire vlogs, but it took so long to upload and all, so I'm just going to put in screenshots so you can compare my hairdos!




This was my first vlog in September, and it was for ASL. The professor was delighted with the composition of my signed essay and everything, but subtracted points on it because of my shirt. Um, oops?








October! Here it looks like my hair has grown out a bit comfortably. But what's the deal with the shirt here, dude?









I clearly remember the reason why I look so crappy in this -- I'd only woke up a few minutes before this vlog was made right before its due date! October as well, I think.









I think this was done in early November, if I'm not mistaken. I'm just loving this snapshot! You can see a bit of facial hair on my chin. I look almost straight -- especially when it looks like I'm gesturing about some breasts.










I went home in Virginia for Thanksgiving break, and got a haircut! My old classic chicken butt hair, seen here :)










Here I am again, looking cute, but the haircut is already growing into my eyes. I also had to borrow my roomie's blanket to tape up so I could tape formal exam-istical vlogs! Also last vlog I did in my first semester.







I did less vlogs the second semester, but I'd figured out how I could make a nice, one-color background by using my blanket and both my roomie's and my closet doors to pin it up! Here's a lovely shade of forest green and my hair, certainly grown out during the month-long winter break!







Oh, behave, baby! This is particularly my favorite -- not because I look pretty good, not because my hair kicks ass there, not because I'm wearing my favorite jacket, not because of the green background.


Okay, I lied. It's because of those.







This isn't the most attractive photo of me, really. I look skinny and ragged, and as if I'm smelling something rancid. Probably some gross cheese I always leave in the fridge.

Anyway, my hair here. Yes.









I look somewhat weird in this picture. I was still in DC, and didn't go home for Spring Break, so I ended up going to a barbershop in DC right outside the campus. I felt like I was betraying my hairdresser of, what, 17 years. The woman did an all right job on my hair, but the bangs kept sticking into my eyes!







Then my hair looked like what it does in my profile picture right here, and we're all done! Is it just me or do I really feel hairy right now?

Room 431. Erm, 421. 431 -- 421!

The subject will be explained momentarily :) First things first:


Gally's students right now know Krug Hall as Ballard West, or simply West
And they refer Cogswell Hall as Ballard North -- or North, yes.

I don't know why, I've heard a lot of speculations and it's a waste of my time, so I shift my choice of words between the different type of people I talk to. My first year at Gally, I lived in Ballard West -- Krug Hall -- on the fourth floor. Apparently, so history tells me, that both said dorms were the first buildings on the campus to have central air conditioning and carpeting in the bedrooms.

If that's the case, then please will somebody tell me why the fuck there is no elevator in both dorms??? Cogswell -- North -- has an elevator, but it seems to have been built in several years later, because the minute you enter North, there is this large eyesore built in front of you, in the middle of the lobby. That's the elevator. For West, the door opens into a large lobby where you can look up the winding stairwell all the way up to the fourth floor. No elevator.

I live on the fourth floor of West, remember?

Here's something else that's also ironic (ironically amusing?) the majority of people living at West last year were thin or average, and the majority of those who lived at North were more than average. Coincidence? Just don't take my word for it, hmph.

I'm not whining about all the stairs that much, it just gets difficult when you have a shitload of books in your backpack, or when you're stumbling drunk and it gets sickening to try and walk all the way up there. But after every time I overcome the stairs, a good, fuzzy feeling would always well up within of me.

Room 431 -- erm, 421! No, wait, 431. Jeez, for a second I was truly confused. For some reason I always thought and always told people that my room number was 421. It usually resulted into them wandering around the lobby, searching between doors that were numbered 414 and 427.

Regardless of its number, I loved my room. I think it was just because of the large windows and the beautiful view I had. I enjoy getting up in the morning and letting in the breeze and the sunshine. Unfortunately my roommate likes his room dark and stuffy -- but whatever. Of course, there are precious memories that will last for a lifetime there. It became my new sanctuary -- a place where I could be me away from home. I held movie nights in my room, completed with popcorn -- just because I had the best DVDs and a comfy mat on my bed! I had a birthday surprise done up by my friends in there. I had my own photoshoots in there, made friends, laughed and cried, woke up hungover, danced, and had my private moments where I sipped coffee and did nothing but write. I loved my room.

My sophomore year, I'm to live at Benson's Hall. I have mixed feelings about that. Colleen and I decided to go to Benson and have a looksee at our rooms. She did, but the people who lived in my next year's room weren't there -- but then I noticed a condom that was pulled over the doorknob. Great. It was later at dinner when I sat with Jesse and found out that he lived in it! It was the same room I had, well, partied in the first semester when my best friend Jessica visited Jesse.



Guess who were the most drunk?







Gally's housing department emailed me last month telling me that they were going to make Benson the freshman dorm this coming fall and asked me to pick between Peet and Ballard West. I deliberated with my roommate and we both picked our old room again -- and I confused them with the 431/421 thing. But then a month later, they backed down on their decision because a lot of students complained. I don't blame them, though, this decision was fast and without warning, but it will happen for sure the fall of 2009.

I just feel like I am demoting down into a sucky room. In a dorm full of potheads and drunkards, no less. At least I wouldn't be surrounded by froshies -- like it would make any difference, anyway. My first year at Gally in West, my hall was full of guys who roomed up with their girlfriends, had sex every night, smoked pot while thinking they'd never get caught (what is that godforsaken smell?) then host abortion parties on Monday mornings.

But I'm not complaining :) Maybe I can live in West -- Krug -- my junior year!

As Promised

I'm finally doing a second post. It is mainly because I'm sitting here with nothing to do. Let's see.

My first semester at Gally pretty much sucked. RJ would tell people that I was gonna quit at one point, and that is only half true! I merely wondered what the hell I was doing there. I was pretty unhappy. Not homesick, so that was good -- you had to have a home to be homesick when away from it, but that's a whole 'nother entry! So anyway, I wondered why I was there since I'd expected so much before I came. It was pretty much "That's it, this is what people have been telling me about Gally? What a gyp!"

So I struggled with myself. I stayed in the closet with Elizabeth. I cried myself to sleep once or twice... a month, I suppose. I lost 12 lbs, which wasn't good. I was failing a class -- it was FYS/Critical Thinking and Writing in English... or some shit like that. It was also in Honors, jeez. I abhorred it. Most of it was the consequences I drew myself (i.e., not reading necessary materials, missing classes, etc) and the professors weren't great either.

People had warned me that the first semester would suck, but I just didn't expect it would suck that much. All in all, I pulled through with a 3.0, just on the line where I can still stay in the Honors program and still apply for VRS support. I told the truth when people asked me how my first semester was -- it was just shoddy, but I came back for the second semester anyway and I loved it all right.

Here are some pictures from the past year at Gally:



Mandie and I, after dressing up in some girl's prom dress -- and yes, that is my own wig.










Elisy and I on my bed.








Meredith and I up in some tower... in... where the hell were we? I forgot, oh well :) keep an eye out for a comment from her explaining this photo!






Me in the Honors lounge, hard at work!











The Union Station, when there's nothing else to do on a Saturday at Gally!!





There are zillions of pictures, but they are either the same over and over, or just piccies where I look crappy in :)

Promise?

Hi guys,

I know what you're thinking. I'm pretty notorious for going through many things until I get it right. My name, my AIM screenname, the arrangement of furniture in my room, and blogs. Namely, I already have one that I have been using for the past 6 years, but it is private. I got this last year in March, expecting to post it full of adventures that's occurred in my frosh year at Gally.

Unfortunately, I never bothered. So this is a second try (okay, what, fifteenth?) So let's see if I will keep this up! I'll post in stuff from my very first year at Gally. It's also very possible that I will spiff this blog up, because frankly, it looks shit.

Thank you!