Emuzines

I have spent most of the weekend studying for my statistics midterm on Tuesday. It is so different from what I normally do/study/think about, so it has taken some getting used to…but I am understanding it and think I will do well on Tuesday. Now I just need to incorporate this knowledge into my research project and actually use it for the analysis…

I have also been walking almost every day. Usually I take JoJo, but not if I am going at a peak dog-walking time. She just pulls too much and I spend more time tugging back at her than relaxing. But sometimes she can be great, and she sniffs all around and doesn’t pull. There are all kinds of trails around here, and creatures and windy paths. The fall leaves crunch under our feet and the trees are getting very orange. It’s easy to get turned around and lost in the neighborhoods here, because they wind all around and loop back on themselves. I like getting lost in the neighborhoods and checking out everybody’s Halloween decorations and gardening. I have been learning a lot more about the neighborhood, too, and we get lost less…

Nik and I had a “night out on the town” Friday and last night. This is in quotes because Davis is such a small little town, and the downtown consists of a grid with streets 1-4 and A-G. On Friday we went out to Pasta?, an Italian restaurant, for dinner, and last night we went to the movies and then to a late-night dinner at Pluto’s. Both nights we spent some time walking the grid, people-watching, looking in the bookstore and shop windows. Nice fall evenings.

Off I go to help finish making chicken parm for dinner…

So…the house has closed, we have keys, and we’ve been busy working on it!  I don’t feel like going through all the steps to upload pictures, but here is a link to some: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2018743&id=1262058331&l=699a7  Maybe Nik will feel like adding them officially onto here, but it’s kind of a complicated process and soon I am going out with my friends, hence short time…

We are going to be painting all the bedrooms, and redoing the floors.  Today we got quite a bit done, more than I thought we could.  All the nail/tack/pin holes are patched, and we cleaned the walls of the office, and put up three paint testers.  There was only one small injury wherein I scrubbed the wall too ferociously, and the sponge flew across the room and my hand smacked the wall.  But it’s been a lot of fun and is going well.  I thought Nik was right behind me, coming home just now…but he’s been gone an extra hour or so–not sure what he’s up to.

The quarter is almost over (one more class) and tonight my friends and I are going out to celebrate.  Better go get ready…

Today is my first official day of winter break!  Ok…maybe yesterday was my first OFFICIAL day, but I worked all day…so today is really it!

We sure celebrated on Thursday after our last day of classes.  Here we are at Bistro 33.

We had a pretty good, but uneventful, last two classes (April and I gave a great puberty-related presentation, and David was a champion wrapping up Piaget in an exact hour)…and then headed out to Bistro 33.  We had some mojito pitchers and sweet potato fries, and had an exciting White Elephant gift exchange.  It went so fast and we were all so polite about (not) stealing gifts that we invented a new, Forced-Trade Gift Game after we were done, to up the competition and laughter.  It was a great time, and we moved inside (thank you, my Southern California, flip-flopped in 39 degrees toes said) for shots…yes, shots…  It was tough to get up for work yesterday, but it was completely worth it.

I made it through yesterday without a zombie-day, which I’ve had 2 or 3 times since starting school, and even just 1 caffeine.  Sally and I worked for a solid few hours on our chapter, which was great.  After work, I lounged around, watched a movie and lots of TV–totally lazy. 

I slept in very, very late today.  So did Nik and JoJo.  None of us had any idea it had already hit the PM.  Nik and I did some Christmas shopping, went out to lunch, and grocery shopping.  It’s so nice not to have to read all weekend, not having enough time to lift my head for a drink of water.  I do have some work on my chapter to do this weekend, or Monday, but I enjoy it and am super-excited about it, so it doesn’t count.

Anyway, yay to winter break!  I’m relaxed already.

I tend to refrain from updating until I have huge stretches of time in which to do a post justice…and that doesn’t happen.  So here is a list of recent happenings.  Time may soon permit me to expand on some of these…

1.  Nik and I had a wonderful, relaxing, food-consuming, amazing, beautiful, great-company time in Amesbury.  Nik is working on a post about it, but Happening #3 got in the way.

2.  It took us 3 days to fly home.  Our plane almost crashed.  It was traumatizing.  We also had broken planes, delayed flights, cancelled flights, bad weather, poorly rated pilots, etc.  We were stranded, after our trauma which made me sick to my stomach (fear, not bounciness), in Phoenix for a night, then we were stranded in Las Vegas for a night.  We thought we deserved a treat, so we stayed in a penthouse suite on the strip.  The shower, to say the least, was incredible.

3.  Nik is sick.  He’s been in bed for 2 days.  He gets to win the “No JoJo on the bed game” (or rather, “Yes JoJo on the bed game”), so they are both quite pleased.  She’s exhausted from Happening #4, so it’s suiting her well.

4.  JoJo had a great time at Wag Hotel.  She has a reputation there, and when we called during the trip, they said, “Oh, JOJO…” and when we picked her up, the workers all emerged from their offices to talk about her.  She’s in the “High Energy Group.”

5.  I am off to my last day of class for the quarter!  After class, my friends and I are going out to have a gift exchange and celebrate our survival!  YAY!

Hi Everyone!

It is Fall now and things are getting really busy!  My mom came to visit me last weekend.  We had a great time, and packed as much fall fun is as we could.  We did some shopping, cooked some scallop chowder, baked some pumpkin pies, and visited a flower farm/pumpkin patch!  I enjoyed showing my mom around my new home and most of all just enjoyed being with her, hanging out at home at night, etc.  I hope she had as much fun as I did!  Here are some pictures…

School has gotten incredibly busy.  There is an extraordinary amount of reading.  At USC, I often got away with not reading…but here, I have a prelim exam at the end of next summer, covering all of the first year’s readings…so I have to know them all.  And the class structure is much different than anything I had in undergrad (predictably) or even at USC.  I feel as though maybe the professors tried to get this sort of feel at USC, a true seminar/interactive type of conference…but it never really happened.  We basically run the entire class, and have to be all smart-sounding and bounce ideas against each other…the professors rarely talk.  I think this type of class is pretty new to all of us, and so we meet 2 hours before each class to warm up!  I feel now that we’ve settled into a good groove and classes are feeling less awkward, with less silences…  Today David found some cricket chirps on his phone to play in case we hit an awkward silence, which would have been great (we should have been quiet!), but we didn’t hit any of those today.

My cohort is so wonderful!  Tomorrow we’re going out to a place called Little Prague, for happy hour and some appetizers and things.  It’ll be the day that Nik meets them all.  April and I have a plan to “set up” our boyfriends, since both are new here and a little lonely.

So school has been busy and good, but work has been busy and wonderful! I have gotten deeper into understanding the ins and outs of the MIND, and learning what I’m doing and what my choices are. Right now I’m working on an intervention study with little ones (12 months old!) with autism, and I’ve also started work on a chapter which will be published in a book by 2 researchers I really admire…and then which will be published in a journal, hopefully. I know that the chapter is due after Christmas, but I’m not sure when the book plans to be published…but in any case, I’ve gotten started! I’m really excited and love going to work. Every day there…I can’t come up with the right words…it’s like Christmas morning for me!
Anyway, all is well. Things are settling into a nice groove, and although some days are really long, they’re good. I have become addicted to TWO cups of caffeine everyday, though. Now, I’ve been to grad school before and I’ve had long work days…but never have I needed caffeine like I need it now! I am an absolute zombie without both servings. But, mm, at least coffee tastes great!!