2 pm Update

more reading
Originally uploaded by purekatherine

I was going to wait to update until I left here in a couple of hours to take care of a couple errands before going to my dad's for dinner, but I just finished East, West and am sitting down to write my commentary on it, so why not distract myself for a minute with updating my progress!

I also took a look at Jane Eyre. I have 33 more pages to read in that than I thought, so it takes up a bit more of the chart than it did before. The part that I have read of Jane Eyre is actually just last week's reading. I didn't finish the assigned portion of the book for last week, so I'm including the whole book now, minus what I did last weekend.

Since I don't have too many other things to be doing tomorrow that I can't put off until Monday, I think that I'll be able to handle the Jane Eyre reading. Also, I don't really have to have that done until Tuesday, so if I get most of it done by mid-day tomorrow I'll be pretty happy.

I have to admit that I'm really liking this pie chart thing, I can definitely see my progress better than just keeping track of it in my head.

Now onto writing over-due responses!

They're back!

So I really am doing my reading this weekend, and I've made another pie chart. I've left out the reading for my history class because that book is at home and I'm at my mom's to avoid being too distracted by other things that I should be doing at home. In an exercise to kind of explore my options I'm observing Lent this year, and procrastination is one of the things that I'm giving up, so here I go, by the time my two laundry loads are done I plan on having the rest of East, West finished, and then I can move onto Jane Eyre and really get going with that!

PS. That shows that I've read 84/211 for East, West and 109/just over 400 in Jane Eyre.

Jedi Pod

On Tuesday on my way to tutor Lizzie I saw something I thought was interesting.

While in traffic, I came up on the left of a Honda Fit (pictured above) with the very interesting license plate "JEDIPOD" that did nothing but make me giggle. I noticed the license plate first, which I enjoyed by itself, and then I noticed how totally appropriate it was for the car which I don't think I'd come across yet. Yes, I realize that it looks more like a storm trooper, what better cover for a Jedi trying to infiltrate?

I felt very connected to the driver, as though I could totally hang out with them and not feel like a geek relating everything to Star Wars (though the LOTR references might still set me back, I don't know how deep their nerd-dom goes).

As I passed the car though, I was both amused and disappointed. We were in some relatively annoying traffic. The kind that isn't really slow enough that you've got to call in late if you're on your way to work, but it's pretty packed and there's a lot of stopping and going. Since I was passing the Jedi pod, they were obviously in a slower lane, and to my dismay the driver was in full on yelling road rage at the car in front of them.

Not very Jedi like at all.

On the plus side, I got to enjoy a moment of two pleasures; Star Wars and irony all in one moment!

Goals again!

I've got some goals for this year that I'm now actively working on, and I kind of feel like I can make them happen.

You're not imagining things, I did copy/paste this from the other entry, but that way you don't have to scroll through all my pie charts to see what the first couple of goals were!


☑ I will not get another parking ticket for the rest of the year. I just paid off more than $350 in them, and I am not so happy about that, so I won't bother myself with them again.

☑ I will not get another over draft/late/over limit fee on credit cards or checking accounts again. I'm officially on the good side of my credit card balances, and will continue to work on staying that way by sending them money, and not using them. Weird how simple that is, huh?

☑ I will be a better friend to those who need it. I used to be much better at this, and I kind of didn't take care of myself as much, though I also tended to be a little selfish at times. It's all rather complicated actually, and could make an interesting fictional character. Anyway, I'm including myself in this list of people who need it which leads me to...

☑ I will ask for help from friends when I need it rather than fishing for it. There are a few specific things that I would really like to do in terms of growing up over the next few months, and one of them is realizing what I can/can't (or maybe will/won't) do on my own. Pride is definitely a double edged sword.

☑ I will get rid of things that I have but don't use. I want to point out that I did not mention getting rid of things that I don't need. There are a whole lot of things that I used every day that I don't particularly need, and those are not what I'm going to be getting rid of. What I need to get rid of is the things that are taking up space and kind of keeping me a little confined to the routines that I've settled into with having them around.

☑ I will do all that I can to get a job. I want out of this credit card debt, and I want to be able to pay my bills.

☑ I won't be too hard on myself when I don't meet my own expectations. I know that I appear to let myself slide on a lot of things to some people, but in reality I'm pretty damn hard on myself, and I'm not really sure why. One of the ways that I'm hoping to not be so hard on myself is to just take care of things more, and if I follow most of these other goals that shouldn't be so difficult.

☑ I will do more things simply because I enjoy doing them. I don't want to have to elaborate on this one.

☑ I will stay on top of my homework better, starting tonight.


Now that I've got a list down, I can try to get back to the reading that I didn't do at all today. Some other issues came up and it was better that I not today. I would really love to go to bed as soon as I click the publish button, but I'm going to plug through at least another 10 pages of Jane Eyre and hope to get through more like 20 before sleep. Then I'm only left with 80 or so for tomorrow!

I'm so much more of a public person than I thought I was. To the point that I'm not sure I'm 100% comfortable with it. I've always known that I was an open person, but the fact that I would really love to talk to so many people about the negatives as well as the positives in my life indicates that I'm more than open. I've held my tongue out of respect, and kind of as an exercise in trying something new. It's a weird thing to realize. Especially when the only things I'd like to share are either the things that I shouldn't, or they feel like secret messages I'm trying to send to a particular person I know is reading.

They're not really secret messages though. They're more things that I'm excited about and want to share because of that. I will admit that these things were found out in the spirit of those secret messages, but again I am not sharing this to send those messages.

After this semester I have 11 courses to take before I'm done with my degree. I'm a little frustrated that none of those courses are offered this summer, or at least not in the listings currently online, but if I continue the way that I'm going this semester it should be technically possible to be done and graduated after the Spring 2010 semester. That is of course if one of my requirements is offered again in one of those semesters. It hasn't been offered in the last three semesters, but there have to be a bunch of people who need it, as there are a bunch of people in the same program as me.

If it came down to it, part of me is thinking about trying to move back into my mom's house for a year to be able to afford taking 6 courses in a semester again, since it would mean taking a lot of pretty intense classes and I might need to be somewhere that I can really focus on them and not have to work at all.

I don't think anything else I have to say is safe for a public venue. Maybe I'll take a nap. I don't think I've intentionally taken a nap since pre-school.

Weekend Reading

I will update this only twice a day this weekend. Tonight before bed, Saturday and Sunday each around this time, and before bed.

Hopefully there will be big changes each time!

11:30

11:30
Originally uploaded by purekatherine

So, by the end of the night I'm not terribly far off of that 1/3 mark I'd wanted to hit. I could stand to read a bit more, but I have somethings that I really should do in the morning, so I'm going to go ahead and go to bed in favor of reading more now.

I'm enjoying the book more than I expected I would. Maybe I'll actually get more than 2/3 of the way through this portion tomorrow. That would be kind of amazing, then I can set up another chart to show all of the reading I have for this weekend!

7:45

7:45
Originally uploaded by purekatherine

I'm not quite as far as I'd like to be right now. I'd originally intended to read 1/5 of my assignment in each of the 5 days I have to do that, but when I realized I have another book that I should be reading before Monday I decided I might want to move through this one a bit faster. So I'm hoping for at least 1/4 of the assignment for each day, but closer to 1/3, so maybe I'll do a little more during commercials or after my shows?

6:30

6:30
Originally uploaded by purekatherine

Getting there! Now it's time to move around a bit again, but I'll read for another half hour or so before Ugly Betty and the rest of the ABC Thursday line-up!

5:15

5:15
Originally uploaded by purekatherine

To be able to see my progress and to have a reason to take some breaks, I will be sharing some pie charts on my reading Jane Eyre. This is the first, from 5:15 today. I actually read this and finished it around 4:30, but then I had to create a Mii on my new roommate's Wii and get within 300 points of pro status in bowling.

Now I go to read at least another 20 pages, what's represented there is that I have read 11 pages of 208 that are to be read before noon on Tuesday.

Goals

I've got some goals for this year that I'm now actively working on, and I kind of feel like I can make them happen.

☑ I will not get another parking ticket for the rest of the year. I just paid off more than $350 in them, and I am not so happy about that, so I won't bother myself with them again.

☑ I will not get another over draft/late/over limit fee on credit cards or checking accounts again. I'm officially on the good side of my credit card balances, and will continue to work on staying that way by sending them money, and not using them. Weird how simple that is, huh?

☑ I will finish this list later, as I started it last night when I got disconnected from the internet, and now I can't remember lots of other things that I wanted to include.

Annoying people

I'm in the English Study room on campus, and there are two guys in here who are annoying me to no end.

They seem to have graduated in 2006, and think that they have all the answers to life since getting out of high school.

I'd like to slap them. None of us have any answers idiots!

Really kind of want to do this.

Friendly Folding Keychain - More DIY How To Projects

Not with my car key, since that seems like a lot of bulk to have hanging from a key while driving and that's not supposed to be the greatest thing, but for my others it would be nice!

School is definitely in

In order to stay on top of everything for school, I have been seriously slacking on blogging. That is ok though, right? I mean, is anyone really going to be mad at me for neglecting my blog in order to get an A in each of my 6 classes?

I'm starting to get into a bit of a routine, so let's hope that I'll update soon!