SQUEE

foolazuli @ 2009-10-14T11:20:00

2009-10-14T18:21:25Z

Life is going well, I've been working a lot which is good in terms of the moving in and needing money to buy stuff part but difficult in that I'm working at a posh country club in side a bubble. literally. the pool is an indoor outdoor so there is a bubble over it for winter. I'm going to start looking for a second part time job, one that is more social, I'm going bonkers being alone at the pool alllllll the tiiiiimmmmmmeeeeee. I'm also complaining alot when it is really not that bad, very chill just very quiet.

I'm loving living with Terra. We went to hood river this weekend so I could meet her parents. They are crazy and fun and her father even threatened me "if you hurt my little girl..." I never thought I would be on the receiving end of that threat, I suppose it is only fitting. By the end of it I' was getting on with her 9 year old brother and I was exausted. these have been my two busy days, and I have two days off comming up so I will be chilling, sleeping, getting over this cold, and looking for more fun work, woohoo!

I don't have internet pretty much ever but I will be getting a hold of some over the next few days.

Thats it for now!

foolazuli @ 2009-10-09T10:01:00

2009-10-09T17:05:12Z

Hello World

How are you doing?

I am in Seattle, I have kind of moved in, I'm finishing that this afternoon
I've started work, I think it is only part time and I am fine with that because this job would send me up the wall if it were more then part time.
I'm looking for other part time jobs and considering taking a class next semester.

I am living with my girl friend, it is wonderful, I love it and I hope it stays this good always.

I don't have internet at home or at work so I have to go out of my way to communicate and now that I have it I don't really know what to say?

I hope you are doing well world and I look forward to hearing bout you too!

Cheers,
~Foo

Dear Claire

2009-09-10T19:00:14Z

I don't know what to say to you anymore.

I could tell you that you mean more to me then you know. That loosing you would mean loosing a piece of me and I would never be the same. I would always blame myself for not doing more and hate you for taking the easy way out.

But I see you. And you are constantly hurting. And I can't tell you to spend a long sad life always in pain, it wouldn't be fare to you and it would hurt me to see you plodding through your life like that. It does hurt me to see you like that. It hurts me that I have had to distence myself from your emotions and realise that I can't make you feel better, all I get to do is listen and watch as each step of your life makes you more and more misreble. So I can't tell you not to kill yourself anymore.

The way I see it you have two options. you can decide to do something truly hard and completely change your life to make it better or you can decide that enough is enough and finally stop hurting. The way you see it you have three. and the more you take that third option, the more you hurt yourself and the more you hurt the people who care the most about you. It is not a real life you are living right now and I can't support you in it.

I love you.

foolazuli @ 2009-09-10T11:41:00

2009-09-10T18:43:03Z

I just wrote this then deleated it all on accident so this may be a condenced version but here we go again:

I've been up at Terra's, decided to look ing to appartments and rooms to see what was available while I was here. found an appartment that I really liked and figured I should discuss with the parents. Kate wanted me to just go and get it. I talked with Joey, he thinks the parents think that I amd moving just for a girl and that is a stupid idea, I think he thinks they think this because he infact thinks it. it is only partially true and I resent the fact that they all expect e to fuck up. I also resent the fact that he keeps telling me how ourageous "lessy drama" is. Who knows maybe there will be lots of drama but I am 23, and I tend to not make the same kinds of stupid mistakes that he and his friends do.

I talked with dad and he told me that he thought it was a bad idea, that I should not mbe moving out of the house and moving to seatle is just stupid, he seemed caught off gaurd by my saying I wanted to move up here and I was deffinitly caught off gaurd by his entirly negative reaction. he saud that he would not support me in my desition to move because it was a stupid desicion but that I am now too old for him to stop me. needless to say this hurt quite a bit to hear. I have never nt done what they want and I think that fact is making this whole thing much more difficult.

my talk with my mom was suprisingly good. she wants me to live wih friends when I move up here and I told her that Adam had already moved and was not going to e moving again. she asked if Terra needed some one to live with. I was shocked.

it just so turns out that Terra's apparment-mate is moving out and she needs someone to share rent with so she needs to find some one to live with her. it goes agains all advice and common sence to move in with her, it could be a verybad idea. But I really want to, though it kinda makes me really ervous to even consider, and I think we are both adult enough to be ale to work through difficulties that arise.

as it stands I was planning to stay at her place when I move up here until I get a job and know what I can aford and then start looking for a place for myself. The idea that te two of us arerunning on right now is that in October I will come up here and we will treat it as a trial period and if by the end of October we stll think it best for me to have my own place I will start looking for a place while she looks for someone else to live with her and if by the end of the month we decide that it is working and we are going to spend all of our time at one appartment or the other any way then I will just stay.

the only problem with this plan is convincing both sets of parents that we are rational and level headed and that we will be grown ups about this.

so that is my life as of this week.

I am excited and now really nervous. I go home in 5 hours and I really don't want to face my parents, especially my dad. I can't take that he is dissapointed in me. I hate feeling like I am fucking up and I don't feel like I have even done anything!

foolazuli @ 2009-08-04T14:57:00

2009-08-05T00:15:59Z

I'm feeling very drained right now.

Camp just ended and it always takes me a few days to get over it but this time I'm also worried about what I'm going to do with my life and I'm trying to deal with a new relationship and the remains of an only slightly older other relationship and having to break news to my parents and feeling lost and like I'm some how failing at life when all I want to do right now is spend a little time living and not planning and planning and planning.

It doesn't help that the two people I go to when I need to talk are across the world and across the country and both busy.

this new relationship is wonderful but I'm worried that my emotions are shallow and I'm going to get over it before I have a chance to see where it goes. I feel bad about the other relationship but I really REALLY don't plan on moving down to LA in the near future and this new relationship is kind of distracting me fully.

frustration

2009-05-29T07:26:22Z

Foo is frustrated
Already it's not like college where even though you have tons of work to do during the week, you can still find time to go to a meal or hang out with friends. But now you have to wait until other people are off work before you can be with them. And then there is the whole difficulty of them having to sleep and be well rested for work the next morning and all you want is to be with them for long stretches of time.

To hold their hand,
sit in their lap,
ruffle there hair,
kiss their lips,
their cheek,
their neck.

uhg, so frustrating.

For once it doesn't feel complicated or stifling or forced and I only have two weeks!
For five years I have been looking forward to being away from LA and all of a sudden, now that I never have to come back here again, I have a reason to stay.

it might be a good frustration, a really good frustration, but it is still a frustration.

foolazuli @ 2009-05-03T16:28:00

2009-05-03T23:39:04Z

Thesis is in
I am so soooooo proud of it which is wonderful
I'm so exausted, I want a chance to breath and revel in the glory of being done with it.
My last tap performance was today
it went really well
I'm REALLY going to miss everyone in the piece
especially since I'm not sure if or when I will see some of them again :(

I mentioned that I want to be able to celebrate
wellllllllllllllllllllllllllll

Tomorrow I have a lab final (I havn't looked at the rocks since the quizes!)
Tuesday I have a 10pg research project due on the history of the cosmological constant and a presentation on it (I havn't even done the research for it)
Wednesday I have my Petrology final project due, which is being double counted as our final exam (I havn't done the background reading or looked at the data yet much less done the analysis or written anything)
Thursday my photography project is due (I still want to do another photo shoot!)

My proffs are required to turn in final grades on friday so that I can graduate so there is NO leeway on due dates. I'm looking at such a black hole of work that I don't even feel like jumping in, I'll just get lost anyway. It is a self fulfilling prophecy of failure and all of a sudden all I can think about is "my last brunch" "my last tap class" "my last lab" "my last class"

I'm in a good mood right now, it is the post performance high but I really really don't want to get to work!

foolazuli @ 2009-04-16T11:54:00

2009-04-16T19:06:48Z

I got hired by my summer camp
I'm trying to decide if it is what I want?
I will feel bad if I don't go back but I really REALLY want Dan to be there.
I might have grown out of it?
I'm not as qualified as others?

My alternative right now is living at home, being trained as a bike mechanic and working out regularly.
But this does involve living at home with my boarder line anorexic mother and working for my dad.
I love them both but they are stressful sometimes.

aside from attempting to decide what to do this summer
my thesis is scaring me
I have 8 days
so it has to be done in 7 so I can print it
which means it has to be edited in 6.5 because it will take a half a day to re-organize the images and format the thing.
I'm going to need a good day to edit (5.5)
I'm going to need to give someone else time to look over it before I edit (4.5)
and this is stretching it
So really I should give myself through sunday to have my next draft done.
I can meet with my prof and send it out to get edited over monday.
add in the science changes decided on by my proff and I on tue/wed
Do final edits on thurs
insert the images on friday
and print it by 5pm

that looks close.
My other classes may have to take a seat on the side lines for a bit but that is what senior thesis is all about:
making you look forward to a time when you can do your reasearch without 3 other classes breathng down the back of your neck.
Right?

It is going to be fine and good and as long as I keep alternating 6 and 7 hours of sleep a night I should make it to the end.

P.S. the guy who joined our tap performance yesterday is really cute in a "I want to pinch your cheeks then joke around with you all day" kind of way. and my friends and I went and saw "Big River" the musical based on Huck Fin and fell in love with the lead actor just to find out that he is a high school senior. Ik!

To you

2009-04-11T02:34:45Z

I was going to write to Jess and tell her that she really ought to update again so that I could know what she is up to and then I realized that I have not written recently and it is only fair for me to write of I'm going to expect someone else to. Here goes:

I turned my thesis rough draft in
It took an all nighter but I was super proud of my work.
almost exactly 24hr after turning it in I got a low grade notice from My geo prof (also my second thesis reader)
I freaked out and set up a meeting with the Scripps learning disabilities specialist (Dani suggested it)
The two of us made a plan for the rest of the semester.
I met with my prof and we decided on weekly meetings and setting me up with partners for labs and homework assignments
I am confident that I will achieve a B, not that grades are uber important but if I'm not getting good grades it means I don't understand the material and that is not cool with me.
I got thesis edits back from my proffs.
Bob was impressed and said I should be really proud of the work I've done.
According to them I have officially passed Thesis, the next steps are just going to make it better.
The number of comments on my thesis are daunting and I"m having a hard time getting back into it but I only have 2 weeks as of today so it is time to take the plunge.

Outside of school work:
I have missed a lot of Capoeira, I'm completely out of shape but this week's classes were awesome, I have 45 days of free gym access (then I graduate!!!) so it's time to take advantage of it.
For the first time, since middle school I think, I don't have a crush on anyone. I just haven't had the time. It is kind of odd but really refreshing and something I may choose to not go back to.
Then again, knowing me....
I spend all of my time at Pomona (the college just south of my campus, about a 10-20 min walk away depending on how far south I go). Between academic classes, tap rehearsals, Capoeira Club, photography, and meetings it doesn't really make sense for me to walk back up to Scripps. As a result, monday-friday I am often down there from 10am to 11pm. a sad consequence is that I never see my suit mates. I feel like I am always missing out on something. I either miss my suit-mates mini adventures while I'm off with the Geo people or I'm berated for skipping out on the geo kids to spend time with the Scrippsies. And of course, mixed in with that is all the work I need to do, the work I should do and the work I just can't be bothered to take seriously.

I think that is a pretty thorough outline of life right now.
Nothing too interesting.
Mostly just stress and the constant attempt to avoid it.

Cheers for now!
~Foo

Thesis

2009-03-24T18:07:40Z

So I have something written for each section.

This happened post waking up with a migraine and a fever and missing my flight back to school.
I am spending 3 more days at home, one was spent in bed.
Yesterday my mom and I sat down at my computer and I dictated my discussion section to her.
We sat here for 7 hours so and now all of my analysis is in words and organized in the appropriate order, I have only to edit it into comprehensive sentences and then edit them.
I"m currently going over my results section, making sure I have explained all of the stuff I now know I'm using in the discussion section.
I also have to go back to the intro and spread it out a little. Apparently each sentence has about a bagilian ideas in it. After that I get to sort through my 60 or so images and organize them into the text, add descriptions and insert my references. Then I am done with my first graft. It is due at 10 am next monday so in theory I should have time, although I am skipping the first 3 days of classes because I missed my flight and "couldn't get another one until wednesday" (ie really needed a few more days to just focus on thesis and calm down) so when I get back I'm going to have quite a bit of catching up to do.

I also got an e-ail from my Geo proff telling me that when I got back we were going to need to chat about my midterm exam. I'm usually a ridiculously good test taker when I'm given enough time, so when I do badly it means I really had no idea what was going on. It didn't help that I also ran out of time.

I think, over the last few years I have trained myself out of the good dyslexia compensating habits I had taught myself. I'm no longer good at making sure I meet with my proff when I have no idea what's going on in the class. I forget to ask for extensions when I don't have time to get something in or when I don't understand it and can't finish the assignment. And I forget that studying for exams and prepping myself for writing essays and writing essays takes me a ridiculously long time. I"m selling myself short by not doing what I know, somewhere deep down inside, I need to do in order to succeed. Because I know I can succeed!

I am completely worn out. I have no more drive. I need to get out of school before I crash and burn in a smoking pile of incompetence.

Life isn't bad, it's just that this isn't the thing for me right now.

Now

2009-03-04T23:17:39Z

I did Model Mugging Self Defense last weekend. it was very intimidating and depressing and frightening and degrading and empowering.

we learned self defense movements designed specifically for women to use against men, we learned them in combination, and we learned how to execute them from various compromising positions. Then we went to a 5 hr lecture on the types of rapists complete with real life stories (our instructor was a police officer). The second day we learned the 4 profiles of the different rapist and appropriate responses and then started the simulations.

The first two fights were choreographed, we had to walk forward and the attacked came up from behind and grabbed us. It was terrifying knowing that he was right behind you and you had to keep walking forward. There were 9 of us so while we were waiting for our turns we cheered each other on. The next two fights we had to try to talk our way out of so they set up scenarios. the whole experience was terrifying but we each managed to fight our way out each time, so it was empowering to know that I could do it. I've done martial arts of some form for 10 years and I still think this class was necessary and good for me. I feel like I can protect myself now and I'm not sure that my previous training would have cut it.

Subsequently I have been having difficulty falling asleep and concentrating. Monday was the worst, it was one of those foggy days where not only did it feel like anyone could sneak up on me at any time but I was also in my post talking about/remembering publicly my past experiences daze. They say the paranoia only lasts about a week, but I find myself in class completely loosing track of the lecture as my brain takes me back to one of the fights and all the things he said and I said. I tried to do capoeira last night and we went to do sit ups and just being in that position made me cringe, and one of the guys in my geo lab started to tease me and got really close and I just looked up at him and said "back off." It is getting better but every time it feels like there is a apart of me missing and my first reaction is to find some one to be around who will help me not feel so empty. I'm trying to not rely on others for that right now, I need to find something else to make me feel whole.

I'm kind of concerned that, at some point I am going to be in a relationship and the only physical experiences I will have to go on are bad, from childhood and from this class, and it will just make it even more difficult for me to move past my fears.

I guess I'll just have to wait and find out. For now I have Thesis due in 30 days and I have not started writing and that whole final project for my half semester class is going to get done some how I assume and there is a midterm that I have done 0 reading for, and it is raining.

Plenty to be distracted by.

The last entry in my journal dated 01-12-07

2009-01-02T22:23:30Z

"Waiting for my Wings to Grow"

I couldn't wait any longer, I got ansy. So I jumped, wingless.
I felt the rush of air beating my skin and I knew the fear of helpless inevitability.
The ground rushed toward me, I stopped breathing and each beat of my heart echoed off the walls of my hollowing self.
It wasn't right, so I flapped. I flailed and kicked, beating the air with such persistence that it stopped fighting back as hard. It began to cower in the face of my vigor.
Word spread and soon the ground began to dread my arrival. It pulled away until my free-fall changed. I was gliding, held on the wind by sheer determination and I was happy.
Too distracted by the harmony around me, I stopped waiting for my wings to grow.

did you hear me? I don't like it when you do that, Ignore me. You just said!

2008-11-12T02:30:29Z

I pissed off my flatmate again.

she does this thing where I'll be talking to her and she'll turn to her computer and start flipping through things still listening and then I'll realise she is reading whatever is on her computer or in her book, no longer paying attention. So I stop and first I have to get her attention, which requires some hailing, before I ask her,

did you hear what I said?
Huh? no.

I feel offended by this.
it is one thing if she tells me,

sorry I'm busy right now lets chat later
or even
hey check this out

even interrupting me would be better then just ignoring me. and then she looks confused when I'm upset. today I asked if she had really been ignoring me and she responded in the affirmative so I told her I think it is rude when she does that

do what
ignore me
I'm not ignoring you
you just said you were
I just got distracted

guess how this ends...
she opens an article on her computer and starts to read while I'm sitting there still stunned that she doesn't see how this is not nice. now she's acting annoyed. Maybe I should just let these things go when they happen but it's hard, it's a remnant of CGST, it's my ouch, she has a right to know when she has done something that hurts my feelings.

foolazuli @ 2008-11-07T16:47:00

2008-11-08T00:51:33Z

I just got a low grade notice

I've never gotten a low grade notice, not even close. every semester they tell us to look out for them and I just ignor it because there is no way I'm getting one.

I don't care about grades, I don't care about thesis but I need to graduate and I need to do it in a way that allows me to move forward. I need to make it out of this place and find a system that works for me.

It feels like I'm drowning, I can't breathe, I just want the whole world to go away and leave me alone

Oregon Shakespeare Festival's "Midsummer Nights Dream"

2008-10-20T18:11:54Z

Oh my gosh, that play is amazing. I want to watch it over and over.

The back story goes something like this: My Grandma takes my mom and me to a hand full of plays every summer so I flew back from my internship in Colorado this summer for a week so that I could drive to Ashland with them. We saw awesome plays but missed Midsummer. After all the reviews I was hearing about it I felt rather sad. I came back home for a week and a half at the end of summer and Hannah came over to plan our road trip back to school. I started to rave about the plays I had seen and mourn the fact that I had missed Midsummer and Comedy of errors both of which looked epic. I showed Hannah the web page and in our excitement we decided to stop in Ashland for a day to see both plays. Midsummer was mindbogglingly wonderful but we couldn't quite shake the disappointment at having arrived something like the day after puck had gotten injured causing a relocation of half of the cast to their understudy roles. They did a fantastic job but it definitely wasn't as clean as, well as we assumed it could have been. Then the rest of the story kicks in. I was studying the play for a class and Hannah watched the movie with me, we started to rave about how wonderful the play was and how much we wished we could have seen the actual cast and our solution was to get on the ticket waiting list and drag our flatmates back up with us. The moral of the story is that, that play and plays like it are the reason I will never be able to leave the theatre behind. as Hannah said, "it is the best high there is, and it lasts longer then drugs" and I can assuredly say it is better then skydiving. We got a speeding ticket, a flat tire and we drove for 24 hours in 48 and it was all worth it. I am fairly confident that I will never be able to see another production of that play without being disappointed that it does not stand up to this one.

They set the play in the seventies, the mechanicals are hippies, and the fairies are punks of a sort. They have pleather pants with boots (Puck's were platform heals) and fishnet tops with tutus around their waists and chains and sequins everywhere. They dance and sing, the whole thing was very sexually charged, the music, lights, sets were amazing. I'm in love with the production, I am so happy and I want to go back so badly and see it again and again.

As far as life goes, I can't complain, I have one and a half semesters left and I'm a bit concerned about thesis but confident that come May I will graduate and that will be a good thing. I'm doing Geology and Astronomy but I have no idea what I want to do when I graduate (I'm not applying to grad school this year). I keep wanting to go back to Theatre for a bit before heading on and after seeing a production like that i start to wonder why I would do anything else. I tend to stick with the notion that when the time comes something will come up and it will be the right thing. it works for summer jobs, we'll see about real life (I'm also convinced that this constant postponing of real life is all a lie, we never really left it, so when we try to re-enter it we are going to go through a sharp shock as we realize it is exactly the same as what we were just doing).

Moving on from my meaning of life type musings, I've been going to the oregon shakespeare festival since I was 16 (minus one year when I was abroad all summer) and I have a bad feeling I've become an OSF groupie. I'll be walking the streets with my mom and grandma and Kevin Kenerly (an actor) will walk by and I'll turn and whisper to my mom, "thats Romeo" and she'll respond either by helping to list off the other things we have seen him in or turning to my grandma and, much to my embarrassment, whispering too loud the wrong role. OK so maybe that only happened once but he definitely heard and responded that he had not yet played Hamlet, but maybe some day he would.

Ashland is my LA, when I want to run across stars I sit outside a restaurant and happily watch people being people rather then rhyming couplet spouting fairies (just can't get fairies off the mind).

drama drama drama drama drama drama drama drama drama drama

2008-10-08T06:05:57Z

I am dramatic

I am dramatic

dramatic things happen around me but I myself am dramatic

it makes my stories more interesting and adds a spice to life but it is also wearisome

i am tired of drama, but when dramatic things happen I get dramatic about them and that is not a good drama

I'm going to work on dramatizing the good and dealing with the bad, that is my new goal

then I'm going to work on my thesis

foolazuli @ 2008-08-05T15:25:00

2008-08-05T21:34:09Z

is going crazy!

have a bloody aweful book (no pun intended) that I'm so addicted to that I sped through the last 3 prequals in 3/5/7 days and now I just want the damn thing to be over..
Don't like any of the charecters, or the story line really
and yet, on day 3 I'm at page 450

am at work and CAN"T FOCUS
this is day two of no focus
Boss gets back in 5 days and I MUST have something to show for it
please please let me have something to show for it
why oh why can I not focus?

need a focus pill, or a firm smack to the back of my head to jump start the braincells that are apparently fed up with me and have decided that vacation sounds like a jolly good time.

Two more weeks braincells! you can do it just hold in there two more weeks

... then you can go back to Uni and start working on your thesis???
bugger bugger bugger!

who, me?

2008-07-30T05:43:54Z

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

sugar hight

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

On Sugar,

Sugar is a useful tool and though it is confusing to spell, it is also very good
reserved for special occasions it adds color to life making verything go by speedy fast with jolts of joy and extreme doses of laughter.

While sugar is never bad, it is less then good right before bed, especially when the goal of bed is sleep.
Sleep does not follow sugar.

a house full of sugared people is very good as well
be sure to vacate before the inevitable plummet to oblivion and hope against hope that you are not the last one still on the rush
everything buzzes but they're all inanimate.

the end

foolazuli @ 2008-05-21T21:12:00

2008-05-22T03:33:40Z

I have discovered my pet peeve.
I hate the sound of other people chewing
and making out (very similar noise)

I don't know why but I hear it and a chill runs up my back and I can't sit still.
It boarders on physical pain, revulsion and a desire to turn to the person and say
"Really!?! Do you mind!"

I sat down on the buss this morning and the man sitting behind me busted out his breakfast and went at it.
It was like I could feel each time he opened and closed his jaws echoing through my body starting with the tensing of my back and spreading to my clenched fists.
I was trapped and all I could think of was how I could get away.

that and stupid people I suppose.
stupid people have always been a pet peeve.

I started work today, after an embarrassing introduction to my boss
I got the worst ID photo in the known history of photo ID's (sort of like every other ID Photo (they have an impressive way of being hideous most of the time)).

and then I got my first assignment:
Three working days worth of reading.

and what do I do when not at work?
Read

This has the potential to be a very quiet summer.

It is 9:30 and I am dead tired, and this is the first time my house mate has made any noise since I arrived, and it is in the form of blasting soft rock across the house.

I don't feel like reading any more, perhaps I'll choose a movie and curl up with my ear pressed against the speakers to avoid disrupting Dave.

I'm writing emo but my firecracker is burning steady.

foolazuli @ 2008-05-19T22:34:00

2008-05-20T04:36:01Z

I am here
And here is silent
No
There is typing from above and rustling from below and I am creating my persona through sound
Or lack there of
I want to play music
I want to call my mom
I want to watch a movie
But it is silent, almost
So instead I’m sitting here checking and checking and checking my
E-mail
Facebook
Live journal

Don’t make any sudden movements
Don’t make any noticeable sounds
Blend in with the sofa
And hold out until it’s appropriate to fall asleep

I’m unpacking and I keep reaching into my bag and pulling out more, and more and more and it just keeps coming in droves and I don’t know where it all came from and I don’t know what to do with it. I’m ruining my image, I am the one who owns nothing, I am a minimalist. But the drawers are full and the desk is stacked and I am in awe.

So it’s just going to chill out here for a few weeks and when I go home it will come with, only it will not be returning the following week.

One thing I know about Colorado, everyone is painfully active “I run a bit” = I have another marathon next week. I’m nervous and full of self-doubt but I’ll try to follow the mutually agreed upon advice.

I’m here, this is where I’ll be, and that is that.

foolazuli @ 2008-05-12T23:55:00

2008-05-13T06:55:35Z

I'm sitting in a classroom today taking a first look at my exam that I've just started. I have a pen, a pencil, and eraser and a water bottle on the table with me. Last night one of the guys I was studying with brought chocolate with a ribbon around it, I had taken the discarded ribbon and tied it around something random. As I flip to the second page of the exam my professor makes eye contact with me from the front of the class, stands up, takes a step toward me and exclaims, "your water bottle has a ribbon in it, it is very girly."

foolazuli @ 2008-05-07T00:32:00

2008-05-07T07:41:35Z

Calm breathing, real living
punctuated by moments of world spinning, heart racing anticipation.
I have wants but they aren't needs.
You have needs but they aren't me.
So here I am
living my life
searching for things to replace you.

Don't call, don't smile, don't wave because I'll come back to you
and you'll just walk away

foolazuli @ 2007-04-06T03:57:00

2007-04-05T16:06:15Z

Slightly intoxicated but sobering up
good night, hard A = the best way
I've got his sweatshirt on
and I couldn't be happyer about it.
Don't keep expectations up,
better to not be disapointed but
He's so sweet and he's more
We'll see what happens in Able Tazman
and if not that theres always Queenstown and
Milford sound in the near future.
It smells smoky and sweet and I feel warm and fuzzy.
Now to bed, I will probably wear it all day tomarow.
Oh Happy Day!

a bit late I know, sorry but here goes

2007-03-18T09:45:07Z

If you have gotten e-mails from me then ou have or will get these, if you want e-mails from me give me your e-mail adress:

Hello world,
I am not dead, my computer is in good working order and I am now officially communicatable. I would say I’ll start at the very beginning because rumor has it it is a very good place to start but I have a feeling that, in this instance, the beginning might not be the most appropriate.
If you are on this list that means you are extra special to me (ignore the fact that there are several dozen others) and if you want off the list you could always e-mail me that to queue me in but I might be horribly hurt by it and leave you on just to spite you.
I am moved into my flat and classes start today for me (it was Tuesday here not Monday when I wrote this, confusing I know). I have 5 flat mates three of whom are Kiwi’s of one sort or another. At first it looked like we were going to be a bit of a geeky flat, and if you know me you understand that there is nothing really wrong with that, I have no problem with geeking out for a bit and then returning to reality again. Unfortunately it looks like returning to reality is not on their list of priorities (and who can blame them, they live in Middle Earth). Suffice it to say there may be two fewer members of my flat before to long and I’m still undecided on whether society will miss them. As classes start we will see how the 6 of us settle in, hopefully it will go smoothly… and be clean.
I arrived in NZ on Valentines Day and my program took me and 39 other Americans to a Nature reserve about an hour above Auckland. It was amazing, you walk out the door of the lodge and down the hill and you are on the beach. The head camp counselor essentially, was an eccentric Maori who made the whole thing pretty amazing from writing a schedule that looked like chicken scratch to demonstrating how to sheer sheep without a sheep. We got to sail, play rugby, play cricket, mountain bike, hike around, go rock climbing, sit in hot springs, try out mountain boarding, archery, orienteering, and Kayaking (I got a Paddle to the face on the 3rd day and had my first black eye!). We slept well there. At the end of orientation they took us to a Marai (Maori gathering house) where they did the full welcome (and we embarrassed ourselves attempting to sing our national anthem) and fed us. It was quite an experience as you feel like laughing when they come at you with their tungs out, until you remind yourself that they were cannibals. That night they pulled out maybe 25 mattresses and 40 pillows, so we each had a pillow but we were packed in like sardines and they told us the history of the Maori from the mythology to the present. That has been the most amazing adventure thus far.
Since I arrived in Ilam Village (the field of flats where I live) I have enrolled (it took me 6 hours to get my classes) worked on cooking for myself, gone to the on campus bar (there is a bar on campus!!!), taken part in a Uni (university) version of The Amazing Race, explored the city, seen penguins, opened a bank account, gotten a phone, used a bucket load of sunscreen and chilled out. The goal is for the chilling out to not stop as classes begin.
Speaking of chilling, it has been raining the last few days, not too shabby really but a big surprise after the preceding days of melting into the sidewalk and flowing around Christchurch. I have gotten used to being surrounded by accents which is nice but I have lost all ability to tell them apart, it is not polite to mix up a South African, a New Zealand and a British accent, it is even more insulting to confuse a Kiwi for an Aussie (they all sound the same!).
I think that is about all for now, expect another update soon.
I trust you are all doing well, e-mail me back and we’ll get a little conversation going (unless you are Hannah Albert, I don’t communicate in full sentences with people who attempt to replace me with an octopus). I’m off to try and buy a bike… maybe…
~Rachel / RC / Foo

I just had the most amazing weekend ever!
Adam, Tori, Geoff and I were all planning to go out to Arthur’s Pass this weekend to test out the Tramping (Backpacking) and have our first big adventure but… there was this huge “wild foods festival” out past Arthur’s pass so half of the country was migrating that way, all of the busses were full and all of the cheep cars were rented. So last minute we signed up for the tramping club’s “Fresher’s tramp” which we had heard was more of a drinking club with a tramping problem sort of deal, so we were a bit skeptical. We arrived first thing in the morning on Saturday to find the pastel purple “Texas Party Buss” ready to take us away to the rolling foothills of the southern alps. There were 65 people total and we staggered our start so that we were walking in groups of 5-10 (Tori and I had opted out of the 6hr summit tramp). The “easy” trail was about as hard as the individual days during outdoor orientation freshman year but the views were amazing, rolling hills on all sides of us and more photo opportunities then I have room for on my computer. We set up camp outside a hut nestled in one of the valleys beside a winding river that we had to cross to get to our tents. We had about a dozen tents of which maybe half were used, we slept under the stars. The Tramp leaders informed us that there were some “caves” about a “10 minute walk” from camp (every time you asked how far something was the answer was 10min… sort of like every temperature conversion was 68 degrees when you asked Garth during orientation). Here ‘caves’ = river covered by fallen boulders with holes and caverns between the stones that the water passed through… and trampers… only the insane ones… like us. It was probably the most amazing thing I have ever done. We started at the bottom of the river by swimming under the first boulder to a place where we could stand (I left my camera behind on this one) and we slowly, single file, working our way up the river. At first there was lots of light, we would climb through rocks and come out into open air and climb over some rocks then go back under the rocks but it got progressively darker as we spent more time in the water climbing up against the waterfall. We were constantly waist deep in river, scrambling over rocks and searching for foot and hand holds to pry our way to the top. Some of the openings were so small we had to crawl or lay on our stomachs to slide against the water to the other side. There was a small opening above us where we had to put our arms through first and go in sideways pulling ourselves through then turn around facing backwards to get our legs up. At one point when we were completely covered by rocks, we had come up one of the two possible routs and had to go up a little waterfall, it was slippery because of the algy. Tori was ahead of me so I waited for her to go then I got my foot and hand holds and as I went to move one of my feet my other one slipped off the rock and I fell backwards, reaching for something to grab onto. I landed surprisingly softly in some shallow water between the two openings that went straight down but my momentum mixed with the moving water kept me moving. I looked down and I was going head first over the edge of the waterfall we hadn’t climbed up when I felt some one grab my arm with one had and reach behind my back with the other, stopping me from going over the edge. Ben and I are now good friends. The whole experience was stunning and surreal and led to the delayed realization that I really am in New Zealand!
Back at base camp Adam had just arrived from his Summit hike and the three of us wound our way down the river to a beautiful waterfall with a swimming pool where we washed up a bit and cooled down just in time for the setting sun. That night we did camping things like cook dinner and sit under the stars. In the morning we decided to take the long tramp home (over a saddle not the summit) and left early. The first third of the tramp I would say was straight up. You would look above you and spot the furthest most peek and see someone up there and say to yourself, “alright, that’s where I have to go” and you would push yourself ‘till you got there just to look up again, spot the furthest most peek and tell your self “alright that is where I have to go” until finally you gave up with the goals and came to the realization that you were just going to go up and up and up forever. The view from the saddle was amazing, especially when we looked down and saw what we had tramped up. Most of the rest of the tramp was down hill. We passed around 4 waterfalls and each time we took off our packs and walked through to cool down and as an excuse the stop going down hill for a while. Each pool in the river Tori and Volker would go for a dip, boots soaking. The trail wound down into a forest where the path went straight up or straight down depending on its mood and we had to find foot holds and hand holds to lower ourselves. Some places looked like natural staircases, only steeper. When we got to our “last little rise” about an hour from the car park Stuart and Volker (the two leaders with our little group) told us it was about 10min to the top, at which point we got a bit skeptical… thus far 10min had meant anywear from 5 to 35 minutes. To this accusation Stuart responded that in 10min we could be at the top, or we could be heading down the other side, or perhaps we might still be heading up, he just said what we wanted to hear. That made sense, we had just been walking down hill for around 4 hours and I wasn’t going back up that so we started up. And by up I men vertical. The last notable stop was a double waterfall at the very end of the tramp. I had already slipped and gotten my boots soaking while crossing the river a while back so we just threw our bags down and jumped in. Tori and Volker disappeared for a bit and we heard a scream from behind one of the waterfalls as the two of them came swimming out. There was a passage behind the right waterfall, pitch-black until you got to the center where some light shone through and water dripped down over the edge then dark again until you arrived at the second side where you had to dive into the water and swim out under the fall. The water was so cold you couldn’t keep your hands in it for 30sec without them going numb and our feet and legs were already gone.
I don’t even know how to describe last weekend in a way that can express just how mind bogglingly amazing it was. I climbed a river stood in 5 waterfalls, hiked for 10 hours, slept under the stars and took about 100 photos.

iPhone: what happens when the screen is covered in smudges?

2007-01-11T19:53:33Z

wow so the semester is over and everything has been so buisy and confusing that this is the first time I have been able to make myself sit down and write something.

The last bit of the semester was rather stressfull:
A paper
2 finals
and a photo project

I went in knowing I had to get a's on all of my finals to ensure A's in each of my classes to balance out my garenteed D in Quantum Mechanics and still be able to study abroad.
I finished the paper in the car with my dad driving home with all of my stuff and I e-mailed it to my proff the day before grades were due. My grades were really good, I got the A's I needed and my Quatum Proff realised how hard I had worked and had pitty on me and gave me a C-.

first part of break was full of family as expected but new years was fun.
I was driving to the airport to pick up my roommate and I had my first car accident. I killed the car but I am fine and there were no other cars involved. it took a whie to get over that and I still haven't driven since. the lack of car has been difficult to deal with as well. it has resulted in me being stranded at home a lot, so I am looking forward to going back to California for a week or so before I head out.

as I mentioned Jess came to visit, we spent alot of time the first few days hanging around preping for the new years party. The party was awesome as usual, I had friends from College and highschool and Joey's friends are all becomeing my friends too so it was just fun. Claire, Jess, Hannah and I decorated a cake shaped like New Zealand and the three of them procedded to make a very sweet and caring video fo me to send me off on study abroad :) Jess and I then spent the first two days of the new year in Downtown Portland just walking (through the rain) from one destination to the next and one night ended up at Hillery's place with Ashlen, Anne and Karen, so she got to meet some of my highschool friends too.

at this point I'm attempting to build up the enthusiasm to prep for studying abroad. I can't wait to travel and I will keep you all updated:)