I need a house husband

So today I decided I had to get the yard mowed.  This guy I’ve talked to online for a few years has offered to mow it for me but he keeps putting me off.  I figured the city is on the verge of telling me to mow it or else.  Some weeds were getting pretty tall.  So in a proud moment, I got the mower started and got going.  It was touch and go for a while, but I got the big side yard mowed and in the middle of the other front yard, the mower died on me.  The bottom needed to be cleaned out which I did but the cord still won’t pull.  So I stopped and put it up for the night.  I’ll try it again tomorrow.

As much as I’m proud of myself for mowing… it is exhausting.  I tried to convince Marty to marry me and become a house husband.  He just laughed.  Oh well. 

Now I feel totally exhausted and could just go to bed any time.  I just think 7:30 p.m. is a little early for bed.  I realized that I have to get my website and a grant project finished THIS weekend.  I’m leaving for Austin on Wednesday after school now and will be gone until late Saturday.  There is simply not enough time to get everything done.  And yes, I should be working on the website but I don’t think I could get anything done. 

I might be going out with some friends tomorrow night.  I need to confirm, but it will be nice to have a girls night. 

The diet

For the first time I had to pay extra today because I gained weight this week.  A pound and a half.  Oh well.  I’m still happy about being a size smaller so I’m not too worried.  Though I was not very smart after school as I went to the grocery store hungry.  I got three small things of ice cream and a bunch of other snacks.  And now I’m eating a big plate of spaghetti for dinner.  I just felt famished and needed some comfort food. 

I felt exhausted today.  Of course it is TAKS testing so the whole week is rather pointless for accomplishing anything.  Luckily I get to do the oral administration of the tests which means I have one student or a very small group and I read the test to them as needed. 

My to do list keeps growing and I still have a lack of motivation.  I really need to focus on the last assignments for grad school.  I have to get my website done by this weekend.  I also have to work with my group on a grant writing project.  I’m also going out of town again next week.  I’m heading to Austin for the state UIL competition.  Our history team earned the wild card spot and we have two students selected for honor crew.  Then after I get back I’ll miss another two days of school for stupid computer training – stuff I could probably do in my sleep.  So now I’m revamping my lesson plans for next week.  I wanted to start speeches, but now I’m going to cover interviewing and do speeches last I guess. 

Tonight will be American Idol and then to bed.  I’m really tired and I don’t think I can focus on anything tonight.  I might try to do a little work on my website, but can’t promise that I’ll get to it.  I think I’m as bad as my seniors right now – I have spring fever, senioritis or some combination of the two.  I want school to be over just as much as they do.

Now that I’m completely stuffed, I’m going to watch some t.v., play some skee ball on my iphone (my new addiction), and do a little web-surfing.  Yes, I should do homework, but I’m just not in the mood.  Don’t judge.

Ready to be home

Though I like getting out of town from time to time, I’m ready to be back home.  None of the students placed at their competition today, but I don’t think they were very disappointed.  We spent a couple of hours at the mall and I found a new pair of black pants in a smaller size that I had to buy.  My other black pants are all starting to fall off me.  (Yay!) 

I should have done some homework during this trip, but once again, I’m lacking in motivation.  I brought a book with me and bought two more at a bookstore though I haven’t read those either.  Tonight I was able to meet my friend Kim for dinner so that was great.  We ate at Cheddars and I had the lemon chicken with a baked potato and corn.  It was pretty good.  Since getting back to the hotel I’ve chatted with Marty, checked Facebook postings, and have been doing the crossword puzzle in the USA today. 

I need to get packed shortly so I won’t have to do it in the morning.  I took my 1/2 tylenol p.m. that will knock me out in about an hour.  We’re staying at a Country Inn & Suites which is decent but my room is right next to I-35.  We’re leaving at 8:00 in the morning and it will be about an 8 hour drive back.  I’ll probably drive half of it.  Time to get busy now.

The busy life ensues

First of all I want to thank anyone that stopped by to visit because of Andrew’s wonderful shout out on his blog.  You won’t find a lot of excitement here –especially with the fact that I don’t really date and my life pretty much consists of school right now.  But here’s the latest on what is going on.

I’m out of town at the moment in San Angelo, TX at a competition.  Though I technically gave up the speech team – at least the official coaching aspect, I’m still the UIL coordinator and so this is one of the few competitions that I handle.  The students weren’t very successful today, but some did o.k.  We have at least one state qualifier which means I’ll be going to Austin in two weeks.  We just got back from eating at Texas Roadhouse which is your typical steak and barbeque place.  I had the chicken fried chicken with mashed potatoes and gravy.  (That’s for Andrew – he enjoys that detail.)

Tomorrow two of the other sponsors and most of the students will head back home while I and the speech coach will go on to Waco, TX for another competition with three students.  I’ll be out of town until Tuesday.  Sometimes I like these kinds of trips and sometimes it is a pain.  Right now it’s a bit of a pain because I have an assignment due tonight and I’ve only gotten part of it done.  It is difficult to focus at competitions like this.  Though there’s a lot of down time, but there’s also a lot of visiting with other coaches and much waiting around for verification and results.  I did get the information read that I needed to and now it is a matter of typing up my response.  Unfortunately it will probably be a late night because in 30 minutes I have to find a grocery store to get a bunch of ice cream so we can have out traditional ice cream orgy.  (It’s not as bad as it sounds.)  Basically we get about 6-8 pint sized ice cream cartons and a bunch of spoons and everyone takes a bite out of one carton, passes it to the next person and so forth.  It has been a long-standing tradition that we’ll have to keep doing.  So we’ll do that around 9:00 so I probably won’t really get started on homework until 9:30 or later.  But I don’t have to do the driving tomorrow so I guess I can just sleep.  

I’m very excited about going to Waco.  I’ll get to see my friend Kim who was my best friend in high school.  We met in the 9th grade and became fast friends but she moved our sophomore year.  We’ve kept in touch over the years and I was in her wedding about 12 years ago.  I got to see her last year and we’ll go to dinner either Sunday or Monday night. 

Well, I guess I’ve wasted enough time on here.  I need to find the closest store and perhaps get some of the homework finished.

Ugh, packing

I got about half of it done.  I’m not finished and now I’m waiting for towels to dry so I can put more laundry in the dryer.  But I’m already tired.  My neck and shoulders have been hurting for the past two days.  I can’t decide if I just slept in a weird position or something or if it is just the emotional stress I’ve been dealing with.  Probably some of both. 

I didn’t get everything done at school today that I needed to, but I got what I could finished.  I’ve left my sub plans so I guess that is what is important.  I came home around 5:00 and saw giant super cell storm clouds in the distance.  Thankfully they were already moving away from the area.  Some tornadoes formed east of here, but I don’t know if they hit any populated areas.  I left to go up to Amarillo around 6:00 and went to Best Buy to get a new computer bag.  I only have about 4 of them, but I wanted a lightweight one with a little more storage space than one I already have.  Then I dropped of some shirts to another coach to deliver tomorrow.  I picked up Taco Villa for dinner (bad me) and then came home.  I chatted with my friend Patrick who I haven’t talked to in quite a long time.  It was good to visit with him online.  Now I've got to get all the packing done and get to bed since I have to leave by 6:30 in the morning.  Ugh.  I think I’ll be sleeping on the bus some!

Letting Go

Tecko died this morning.  I was glad I had another evening with him.  I finally got him to eat some liver on his own last night, but I knew it really wouldn’t help.  I just petted him and made him comfortable.  I knew he was close this morning and I waited until I had no more time before leaving for work.  He probably died within the hour that I left.  I came home at lunch to make sure and he was gone.  I thought about burying him, but I’m just going to have him cremated.  I’m taking him to the cremation place shortly… just trying to stop crying a bit.  I focused on cleaning up his bedding and the towels I had put down in my bedroom and getting rid of all the litter box materials.  My other cat did use the litter box, I only recently got it for Tecko since he wouldn’t go outside much.  Now I have to gather myself and take care of the rest of this. 

I’m glad I didn’t have to get him to the vet.  I was right all along, he was just more of a fighter than I thought.  I think he went fairly peacefully which is the way it should be I guess.  It’s hard altogether, but you just deal.  I have so much I have to get done today, but sometimes other things are just more important. 

In other news, I saw this vehicle in the area yesterday which made me a bit nervous with the threat of more storms.  Thankfully we really didn’t get much of anything last night.  Unfortunately, they’re expecting more storms today.  At least American Idol wasn’t interrupted last night. 

Well, I’ve got to head out and take of this unpleasant task.  I have to be back at school by 1:45 so I better get going.

This Sucks

This is why I don’t want any more animals to take care of.  Tecko (the Cat) is still hanging in there but still not eating voluntarily.  Here’s the deal.  He’s been skinny for a while, but has eaten regularly up until last week.  On Thursday I noticed he started walking funny and I figured he had a stroke.  He couldn’t keep food down and was mostly listless.  I figured that it was the end for him and I’d just make him comfortable for the last few days.  Though he wouldn’t eat, he would still get up to drink water and use the litter box.  When I get home he wants to come out of the room and be in the living room on the couch or the chair.  He’s still hanging in there and making the effort.  He doesn’t seem to be in pain.  I don’t know if his condition is really just old age or something else.  So now I’ve been force feeding him some and he’ll eat if I get the food in his mouth.  But he still won’t eat on his own and can’t walk straight and he’s very, very skinny.  So I called my dad because Tecko is really my dad’s cat and I’ve just been taking care of him since I moved into this house.  Dad at first thought I should just take him to the vet and put him down.  I don’t really want to do that if the cat still seems happy and isn’t in pain.  But I’m going out of town on Friday and will be gone for five days.  I can’t just leave him at home to wait it out and have someone else check in on him and force feed him.  So dad says that I should at least have the vet check him out and decide if really nothing can be done or if there’s chance of recuperation.  But I don’t know how and when I can get him to the vet.  When my roommate gets home tonight I’ll find out what her schedule is and see if she can take him.  If not, and he’s still hanging on tomorrow I’ll try to take him after school.  I just hate all of this.  But I have the feeling that if I do take him to the vet, it will be the last time I’ll see him and I’m attached to him.  That happened to the last cat I took to the vet.  I also had to have my dad’s dog put to sleep several years ago and I hated that just as much… but she had visible tumors all over her, lost the ability to walk completely and couldn’t get outside to go to the bathroom.  I still hated having to do that as well. 

So that’s my life at the moment.  I’m stressed and worried about the cat.  I’m way behind on yearbook stuff at school.  I moved my “teacher station” to the back of my room today so that I could watch what my students are doing on their computers.  They hated that.  I’m not sure if I like it either at the moment but I’m going to see how it goes until the end of the school year.  I need to get some grad school work done sometime this week, but I’m not very motivated at the moment.  Imagine that.  Well, I’m going to try to find something to eat and then watch American Idol.  My neck hurts.  I must have slept on it weird.  Oh… that’s another thing.  I have some kind of rash sprouting up now so I took a benadryl last night which knocked me out.  Life kind of sucks at the moment.  If it’s not one thing, it seems it is always going to be something else.

Fairly lazy Sunday

Well, I wasn’t as productive as I should have been, but I’m not going to complain too much about the weekend.  Of course that means I’ll be scrambling this week but that’s the way it usually is.  I’ve done quite a bit of laundry.  I got one assignment done.  I did not grade any papers or make any plans for school tomorrow.  I did finish reading the book I’m supposed to teach to my English class next week.  I did transfer some files to my new computer but left most of them on the old one.  If I find any time this summer, I’ll go through them in more detail. 

My cat is hanging in there right now, but isn’t eating at all.  He can’t walk very well, but still makes the effort to get around.  I’m just trying to make him comfortable. 

I have to figure out what to do with my classes when I’m gone at the end of the week and the first part of the next week.  At this point I have no idea what I’m going to do. 

I wasn’t very smart the other day.  I was at Walmart and I bought a frozen pizza because it looked really good and I thought about making it tonight when I remembered that my oven doesn’t work.  So I ordered a pizza online instead. 

Well, it’s not a very exciting post today.  Well, I guess most of the time they aren’t anyway.  I’m just trying to post more regularly again.  I’m going to go work on some more laundry and then probably just play with my computer some more.

Productivity?

Though I am not sure that I will be, I have hopes of being productive today.  I haven’t slept much in the past few days as I’ve been concerned about the cat – who is still hanging in there right now.  Last night I was able to sleep a little more – at least for longer periods.  I still got up at midnight and 4 a.m. to help him use the litter box. 

Now I’m set up in the living room with my computers side by side trying to decide what information I want to transfer over the to the computer.  My old computer is only 40 GB and I have a small external hard drive that is 160 GB and is almost filled.  It has stuff from my school laptop, my school files, my old desktop and my old laptop.  I’ve ordered a new 1TB external hard drive and I’m going to try to put everything on there and regularly back up this new computer.  I do need to transfer some fonts, documents, and all my music. 

My ex-husband called me today to tell me the story of his trip to Vegas with his girlfriend.  Turns out that the trip didn’t go well.  She got really, really drunk, created a lot of drama and he had enough of it.  It’s kind of ironic because they were staying at the Rio which is where we stayed on our first trip there, and I got drunk and we had a fight, but I at least stayed in the room.  From what I understand, she was going up and and down the halls screaming at 4:00 a.m.  They came home on Thursday and he managed to get back home before he completely broke it off.  This is the second big drama thing he’s had to deal with.  But I think that is is lot… he has an attraction for women with lots of drama.  I can’t say that I didn’t have my moments, but I’m tame compared to some he’s dated!  I’m appreciating my own singlehood even more at the moment. 

Of course I’m spouting about being productive and I’ve already spent a good portion of the morning on facebook.  But to be fair, I’ve also done some laundry and contacted Canon in regard to replacing the print head on my printer that no longer works. 

Today’s agenda is to get through the last three tutorials for my web design class, post a discussion that is due today, and get started on my web design project.  I don’t think I should wait until the last minute on that one.  I also need to go to town at some point and look at more beads for rosaries.  I’m slowly getting the word out and people are wanting to place orders for them.  That’s one reason why I want to work on my website – that way I can get the rosary site up and running again. 

Got the new computer

I got my new computer at school today.  I wasn’t able to do much with it at school without being able to connect to the internet.  I haven’t decided what, if anything, I will uninstall from it.  Now that I’m home, I’ve be working on getting all the “stuff” that I need on it.  Right now I’m using Windows Live writer to post this blog.  This will be the first time I’ve used this so we’ll see how it works. 

So far I love my new computer.  It is very pretty and runs very fast compared to the old system.  I have the other computer set up next to me as I’m using it to set up email stuff and deciding what I will transfer to the new computer.  So far I’ve downloaded Firefox, Mozilla thunderbird, iTunes, and Yahoo messenger.  I’ve installed my Microsoft Office suite but it is the 2003 version instead of 2007.  I figure that I’ll wait until 2010 comes out in October before I upgrade. 

It has been a few sad days for me lately.  One of my cats, Tecko, who is really my dad’s cat is very sick.  He’s not doing well and is probably not going to last much longer.  But he’s around 16 or 17 years old and has had a good life.  He’s lost weight over the past few years, but in the last couple of days he’s taken a turn for the worse and can barely get around.  He is really trying but just doesn’t have the energy.  I’m just trying to make him as comfortable as possible right now.  I really hate this.  This is why I don’t want more pets.  I hate when you have to let them go and deal will all of this.  It makes me very sad.  Yesterday I left him in my room with towels around in case he got sick and left him some water and a shallow litter box – he still tries to use it like he knows he is supposed to.  I came home at lunch to check on him because I wasn’t sure he would even make it through the day but he was hanging in there.  Today I didn’t come home at lunch but I did leave as soon as my last class was over.  Well, it makes me sad to write about this so I’m going to stop now.  I’m going to keep working on my computer and get it all set up.

Car updated

I finally got my car updated so my anti-lock brakes should work as they're supposed to. I left school early again and went to the Toyota place and it took about 35 minutes to get the update. I then went to my friend's house to give her two rosaries that she bought from me. After that I was very bad. I went to Taco Villa totally blew the diet. If I had just gotten a meat burrito grande, it would have been ok... but nooooo... I went way overboard. It was just one of those days where I was just really, really hungry. I ate every bite and then even had an ice cream sandwich. I think I'll need to just not eat for 3 or 4 days to make up for the gluttony.
Now I'm home and about to watch idol. I hope it isn't too painful tonight. I hope that they don't boot off one of the ones I really like. After that I'm going to try to go to bed early. I read some last night and I was really tired this morning.
To respond to Mago's comment on the previous post I already know why my students won't read the book...
"I hate reading...."
"It's boring, miss..."
"It's too long..."
"Why do we have read anyway?"
"I don't have time to read cuz I have a job"
"I'm just not going to read it and you can't make me..."
"I'll take a zero.."
"I don't understand it"
"These words are too big"

In short, unless it is a playboy magazine, a Goosebumps book, or or a you tube video, they simply aren't interested.

Well, Idol is on so I've got to focus on that.

Just a post

Nothing much to say today. I took my car into Toyota today to have the software update put on for the brake recall issue on the 2010 Prius' but an hour and a half later, they couldn't do the update and at the late hour their tech support wasn't available. At least I got the tires rotated and they didn't charge me for that before I left. But I do have to go back tomorrow to get the update. I spent the time reading the book I'm supposed to teach in English next week. I think the book is fine - I can get into it, but I can see why my student's can't and they're opposed to it. Not sure what I'm going to do about that because they're NOT going to read it.
I watched American Idol tonight but I didn't get to see Crystal sing. She's one of my favorites, but really liked Lee Dewyze tonight. It is going to be a tough cut tomorrow.
There's not much else to tell except I can't seem to lose weight this go around with the biggest loser challenge. I lost three pounds the first week and have stayed the same for the last two. It doesn't help that I'm hungry all the time right now. Ugh.
Things have slowed down some school-wise but I still have a lot to get done in the last two months of school. I'm rethinking some courses I'm taking in the fall.
Well, I'm off to bed... going to read a little and just call it a night.

The thing about reading...

The thing about reading books is that once I get into them, I have a difficult time putting them down. I started a book yesterday and read half of it until after 11:00 when I decided that I had to get some sleep. So I brought it to school and I didn't get to read it much until the end of the day. I left school before 4:30 which is almost unheard of for me. I heated up leftover pizza for dinner and am now chatting with Marty. I'm going to get back into the book shortly and finish it tonight. My favorite show, Chuck, is coming on but I can't watch it. I've missed two episodes and I won't watch a new one until I've seen the others. I'll let the DVR record it and watch it later this week perhaps. I have to put in a few grades for my yearbook students this evening, but other than that, I'm free. Can you believe that? I may do some laundry. I really need to get caught up on some housework, but I probably won't. Just because I have the time to clean, does not mean that I want to or will do it.
I finally called to get an appointment for my Toyota to get the software update. I just haven't had time in the last several weeks. I'm taking it in tomorrow and will also get the tired rotated. I should probably find another book to take with me tomorrow.
Well, I think I'll read some more unless I decide to take a nap. Either is a possibility at this point. Mondays are always exhausting.

The "me" day

Yesterday was a "me" day. I slept late. I had a bowl of cereal and then took a shower around 11:00. I had to get to the bank by noon to deposit some checks so I did that and then headed to Amarillo. I got my hair cut. I'm trying to get a style that works with my naturally wavy (but not curly) hair which is mostly a pain. Stylists have commented that they like my hair, but I typically find it irritating. So I went with a bob that is just below my chin. Basically kept the sides of my hair the length it was, but had the back cut to that length and layered again. I think it works. I've only had the weekend to deal with it.
I went shopping and got some clothes in a smaller size. I'm almost down to a relatively normal size (14) but hope to get to a 12 or a 10 would be better. I've lost about 18 pounds on a good day but I need to start working at it more. My friend Pam and I went to On the Border for lunch and I totally blew the diet, but it was so good. We then went to a craft store and a beauty store. I got some more rosary beads and some cream stuff for my hair. I then dropped my friend off at her car and went to the bookstore but didn't find anything for myself. I did get a book for Josh, but I decided I should just read the books I have at home first. By that time I was thoroughly exhausted and full from lunch so a nap was in order. I came home and napped and then got up around 7:00 and watched t.v., surfed the web, and pretty much did nothing important though I did start a new book.
Today I played at Mass, went to the grocery store and then ordered a pizza for lunch/dinner. I read some of my book then napped a little bit until we got a little bit of thunder. Of course my dogs freaked a little bit. We didn't any kind of thunderstorm, just a little rain. Everything stayed to the east. I started generating some ideas for my website project today and posted two grants for my assignment due this week. I didn't grade papers, but I only have a few to grade and can do that tomorrow. I'm going to head to bed now and read my book for a while.

What I should be doing...

What I should do today is clean the house, do the laundry, grade a few more papers, research grants for grad school, do two more assessments for my web design class, give my dog that stinks a bath, go grocery shopping, and figure out what is wrong with my oven.

What I'm probably going to do today is get a hair cut, go to the craft store, go the book store, eat dinner with my friend, Pam, and watch t.v. and surf the web when I get home. There's always Sunday, right?

Unusual Night

So last night I was having this dream. I was dreaming about an alarm clock that was making a high pitched steady beeping noise. In the dream the clock was unplugged but it was still making the noise. I was frustrated because I couldn't get it to stop. I was further frustrated by the fact that I kept dreaming about it... until I woke up and realized that I was actually hearing that noise. At first I though maybe it was my roommate's alarm clock and she was sleeping through it. I got up to investigate. It turns out it was my oven. It was displaying a code labeled "F7" and I didn't know what that meant. I hit the button that turns off the timer and it stopped. So I went back to bed. Thirty seconds later the sound starts again. I go back and hit the button again. It stops. About 20 seconds later it starts again. So get my laptop and search "GE oven F7 beep" and it just tells me that there's a connector issue and to fix it basically you have to take the oven apart. So instead I find the breaker switch for the oven and shut it off. So eventually I'll have my brother come out and take a look at it. I just hope it is an easy fix. Ah the joys of home ownership! So I tried to go back to sleep at 3:00 but it was intermittent at best. So I'm tired and I'm going to bed now.

Almost Friday

I have a very brief assignment due tomorrow. It should only take a couple of minutes to write so I'm not worried about it. I need to work on my website soon. If I go ahead and get it done, I'll pretty much be done with my website design class. I'm going to try to get my last two assessments done and the journal and hopefully will have that out of the way. I finally got the rough draft essays looked at. Many were full of plagiarism. I stopped reading those after the third page. I told the students today to fix it on their final drafts. I know these are just standard students, but that's still unacceptable.
I stayed after school to work with some students from another school on their LD cases and earned $175. I was only expecting about $50 so that was a nice surprise.
I'm going to head to bed and see if I can some actual sleep and not be so tired the next day.

Computer Specs

These are for my friend Andrew and anyone else that is a techno junkie.

I've decided on the Dell Studio 15 laptop. I currently have an Inspiron and strongly considered it, but I went with the Studio to get a more updated processor. I also liked the look of the Studio vs. the Inspiron.
My current system is an Inspiron 6000 with a 1.7 GHz processor, 512 MB of Ram with only a 40 GB hard drive that I've filled up a few times already and have had to move stuff to an external drive or back up on CDs. This laptop is already 4 years old which means it is time to upgrade I think. I upgraded the standard memory from 2.13 to 2.26, went with a better wireless card, and the 9 cell battery. I don't really need the web cam but it is standard on the machine. The problem with going with Windows 7, 64 bit is that my adobe software can't be installed, but it is really software for the school so I'll just have them update my school Macbook with the newest software anyway. Eventually, I'll get my own copy of the Creative Suite. Here are the specs of the new system with comments italicized.

COLORS	Plum Purple <---- my favorite color!
PROCESSORS	NEW 2010 Intel® Core™ i3-350M 2.26GHz (3M cache)
OPERATING SYSTEM	Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium, 64bit, English
MEMORY	4GB Shared Dual Channel DDR3 at 1066MHz
HARD DRIVE	500GB SATA Hard Drive (7200RPM) <----- a nice upgrade from 40GB, but I'm sure I can fill it up!
MOBILE CONNECTIVITY	Internal Mobile Broadband not included <--- Not needed at this point. Am considering it, but right now it's not an extra bill I want. Most of the time I'm out of town I stay at a hotel that has internet service.
WARRANTY AND SERVICE	3 Year Basic Service Plan <---- a must, I've found Dell laptop screens typically go out after about 2 1/2 years and they have always replaced it with a home service call.
VIDEO CARD	Intel® HD Graphics
HD DISPLAY	15.6” High Definition (720p) LED Display with TrueLife™ and Camera <--- 1080 display not necessary for me... I rarely watch movies on my laptop and I just need to view web pages and word documents mostly.
WIRELESS CARDS	Intel© Centrino© Advanced-N 6200
KEYBOARD	Standard Keyboard <---- they offer a backlit keyboard for an extra $25 but I didn't really see the point. I type by touch anyway so if it's dark, I don't need the keys lit up for me.
BATTERY OPTIONS	85 Whr Lithium Ion Battery (9 cell) <---- Extra battery life is always good!
OPTICAL DRIVE	8X Slot Load CD/DVD Burner (Dual Layer DVD+/-R Drive)
SOUND OPTIONS	High Definition Audio 2.2 <---- Don't need anything fancy for sound... I sample music on my laptop when downloading to my player, but don't usually jam out to music on the laptop.

My only issue now is that I'm waiting to order it because the ship date is scheduled at the time I'll be gone for five days. I'm going to check to see if I can have it shipped to the school since I'm never home to sign for things anyway.

Two papers down

And I'm exhausted. I was up until midnight last night. I uploaded my paper at 11:15 but then had to get some yearbook pages uploaded. I have made an executive decision tonight to NOT grade papers. I am watching American Idol and not going to worry about school stuff tonight. I might regret it later, but I just don't care right now. I need to get the rough drafts for the English papers read but I'm just going to give them a make-up work day tomorrow. Some need to retake a test and others have some essays to turn in. My speech classes started 24 hours of silence today which means they have to be quiet in my class tomorrow. (It is a project where they don't talk for 24 hours and communicate completely nonverbally). I think I'm going to make them put themselves into groups tomorrow and communicate nonverbally on a project. It will be interesting to see how that goes.
I think I've narrowed down the new computer I'm going to order. I keep upgrading it though. Price with tax & shipping is now at $1035. But it should be a good system and I have money from school that I can use for it. This computer is making me angry these days. It takes several minutes to start firefox and if multiple programs are running it freaks out from time to time.
That's all the excitement here today. I'm just physically tired. I'm going to be in bed by 9:30 tonight.

Shhhh - Don't tell

But I just took a 2 hour nap. I do feel guilty as I should have been cleaning my house, doing laundry, grading papers, and working my next paper that's due, but I enjoyed it.
I woke because Josh called me. I'm thinking about doing all the things I just mentioned, but haven't gone beyond that yet. I'm also thinking about looking a laptops online. Mine really frustrated me last night and though I was thankful it didn't crash in the middle of trying to get my paper uploaded, it was still going very slow and I was very stressed about it. This laptop has been good, but I think its time has come. I can pay less than what I spent 3 or 4 years ago and get a far better machine.
So I'm off to do a little online shopping (now that Lent is over) and then maybe I sweep the floor. No rush though.

The damn paper is finished.

I don't why this paper was such a big deal. I liked the topic, but I just didn't get into it. I think perhaps I had too much information which was overwhelming. 20 sources of information is too much for a 10-15 page paper, but that is what the professor required. I actually started with a lot more, but pared some of it down. I didn't do much analysis in the paper, but it is what it is and there's nothing I can do about it.
I got up around 9:00 today and continued writing. I finished the bulk of the paper around 2:30 then sent it to Josh for editing. (He is amazing with grammar.) Then I worked on my reference list. He sent it back to me and I worked on a lot of edits until I had to get ready for church. I was supposed to be at rehearsal at 7:30 but I didn't even get in the shower until 7:10. I got to church by 8:00 and the service started at 8:30. I love the Easter Vigil service but it is incredibly long. We had to go through ALL seven readings with a song after each one of them. The service didn't end until 11:40 and I still hadn't uploaded the paper. I played two verses on the last song (instead of 4), then put up my clarinet and the ran out of the church. I drove home as quickly as possible and got here at 11:50. I madly typed the last few corrections (that I read while at church - bad me) and uploaded my paper at 11:57 p.m. Now it's done and I'm going to try not to think about it for a while. Of course tomorrow I have to work on yet another paper. Luckily it is written, but it will need some massive editing as well. I am really tired of school in general - my job, grad school, everything. I'm feeling totally stressed and could use a break. (Yeah, I know, I just had one during spring break.) Now, I'm having a snack since I didn't get to eat supper. I have to go to bed so I can get up for the Easter service tomorrow. Perhaps I should really learn to say "no" one of these days and not be at EVERY service.
O.k. I guess that is enough complaining.

And so it goes

The paper isn't finished, but I've made progress. We had half a day of school today so I worked a little bit this morning, then had two classes, then continued to work. I have half of it typed and now down to the main part of the paper. I have the topics for this last section lined out and all the sourced marked. It is now just a matter of piecing it together. I ended up with way too many sources and had to pare down some. I was typing along today and just got to the point where I needed a break around 2:00. So I worked on my other assignment that was due today and got it finished in about an hour. I had to read someone else's research proposal and comment on it. I was in total teacher mode and wrote a lot of comments. I was finished with school at 11:20 today, but didn't leave until 3:30 since I was trying to get work done.
I came home and made some shrimp scampi with fettucine for dinner. Today is Good Friday so it is fasting and abstinence. I only had a small snack earlier today and I just ate my big meal. I took a shower and need to start getting ready for Church soon. I'm singing with the choir tonight. After church I hope I can focus and get more of my paper done. It is due tomorrow by midnight but that really means I have to have it done by 7:00 before I go back to Church for Easter Vigil. It's totally my fault for procrastinating and being rushed now. But I always tend to work best under pressure I guess.
Tomorrow I must finish and then will have to focus on my other paper due on Monday. At least that one is done other than editing some, adding sources and my reference list. I'm sure you're excited to read about all my work for grad school. But that is my life right now. No love interests. No interests whatsoever. I'm still debating about applying for the job in Dallas. I have no time for anything else other than homework at the moment. I'm looking foward to a time when I can read a book for pleasure. Go out to eat. Go to the movies. Right now my only source of entertainment is chatting with Marty in the evenings and watching American Idol.

A second post?

Unheard of! I don't know why, but I cannot focus and work at home. I have the t.v. off. There's nothing in particular distracting me, but I cannot get myself to get focused on working on my paper this evening. I don't know what I'm going to do tomorrow. The library is closed. I guess I could stay at school but I'm not sure I'll work there either. Maybe I should check into a hotel for a night so I'll really be away from it all. I don't know what I'll do. I guess I'll figure it out tomorrow. I'm going to bed.

Paper Update

I slept in a little this morning. Got up at 7:45 instead of 6:30. I went to Walmart to get yet another ink cartridge. My Canon printer that I got less than 5 months ago doesn't work at all. The new HP I got last week works but I've already run out of black ink. The replacement ink package for both color and black ink costs almost as much as the printer did.
I tried to go to WT to work at the library there today, but I couldn't find an open visitor park slot. So I went to Sonic and had breakfast and read through some of my research materials. I then went to the public library and worked from 10 a.m. until 4:30 p.m. No breaks other than one bathroom stop. It took about 3 1/2 hours to read through all the literature I had and mark it. I tried to keep it organized by color-coding. Green stickies and highlighted material was one topic area, orange another, etc. The picture shows only a portion of the material I used. I have about 20 articles and 5 or 6 books with information. I got the first section typed which is about 4 pages so far. The paper is supposed to be 15-20 pages. I'm home for a quick bite to eat and then I have to get ready for Holy Thursday service. After it is over, I'm heading up to the college library to continue working. I need to get at least half of it done tonight. Tomorrow I have half a day of school and I only have two classes. I plan to leave at 11:00 and get some more work done. My goal is to get the paper basically written by tomorrow night and then spend time editing on Saturday and getting the works cited and other small details done. I also have to finish an assignment for my other class tomorrow as well. It seems it is never ending.
Off to take a shower and get ready for Church.