revived from the dead!

Aaaaand, I'm back online! Where to begin and tell you what's happened to me in the last two weeks? Let's start with a horror most fresh in my mind, finalssssss! *dundundunnn!*

So, in college, you have finals at the end of every semester. (A very unwelcome shock to me since my high school only had finals at the end of the school year). They're usually three hour written exams, or a research paper. During this time you'll find the libraries absolutely crammed with people, as students try to frantically inhale four months' worth of notes and slides. This usually leads to some pretty bizarre behavior as people try to cope with the stress (as much as 1/2 of your grade for a class could depend on this exam!). There was a Facebook invite to a rave at Clemons (one of our biggest libraries) one night. At a certain time one weekday night, hundreds of students showed up to fourth floor Clemons to dance around. Some arrived with glowsticks, a couple arrived with boomboxes and blasted music. Then there's always free massages (courtesy of the Colonnade club, I think) and late night study hours from some dining halls to look forward to.

There's nothing much to be said about the exams themselves, but I have to mention my final for my comm school classes. Four. day. takehome. Crazy. (Most take home exams are around six hours. Four days is certainly an epic timeframe.) As I also had my accounting final on the first day, I wanted to claw my eyes out somewhere on the second day. What kept me sane? The light at the end of the tunnel, known as winter break. I'm currently overseas, but will try to pop in (I never know when I'll have access to internet) every now and then.

PS. Those of you who haven't downloaded the patch to fix IE's fatal security flaw, please do so ASAP!

lovably insane.

I just had the pleasure of being serenaded in my room by Alvin and the Chipmunks.



Well, not really. It was two of my very musically talented sisters who decided to do an uncanny imitation of them and go around the house singing. Oh, my lovably and sometimes insane sorority sisters..

So. This week is the last stretch. Home stretch. My final paper for the report was turned in on Tuesday, and I actually had to pull the first all nighter of my life to do so. I know, I know, I don't even really want to think about it. =P Our final presentation is tomorrow, but all other blocks in the comm school have already presented for their sponsors. Ve are ze last!

When Rolls-Royce was here for block 6 today, several members of my group went on stealth missions to scope out the opposition. Response? They had a fleet of people with them. They actually took up the entire back row of our classroom. O_O We definitely got the most number of execs, I think three people came to Macy's blocks, and somewhat more people to the Dell and Dominion blocks. After final presentation tomorrow (at 8:30 am!), I have an accounting final next Monday and a four day take home exam due next Friday. I.. also have a concert on Friday and Saturday, and my sorority's formal on Saturday. *cue head imploding*

Nah, I'm used to it now. Nothing really fazes me. Keep throwing stuff for me to do at me! I'll take it all on!

Alright, so maybe, just maybe I'm slightly batty right now.. let's talk about a more sane topic in my next post.

PS. We asked our mentors to come and watch a run through of our presentation today (apparently I preach how bad one project is. Oops. Must not preach! Must not preach!), and one guy mentioned "Do any of you guys write the UVa blog?" O_O!! I had no idea my fellow students actually read this. Heck, I had no idea anyone within 100 miles of me read this! (Remind me to share with you guys a map of all the visitors I get sometime). That was a very gratifying moment. :D

crazy friday.

Aw. I was really hoping for a Virginia win. In the first half of the game it really looked like we had the momentum, but we switched Hall out.. still scratching my head over that one.

So.. onto that craziness that was Black Friday. For some reason, the few friends that stayed in Charlottesville and I decided it would be an awesome idea to get up at 2am, drive to DC, and wait for Tyson's to open (biiiiiiig mall in the DC area). So, we did just that, got there when the mall was almost completely empty and wandered the halls, staking out the stores we would hit up. Two girlfriends really went all out and went on a exhausting hunt in all the stores. I was personally a bit too tired to really shop and mostly just wandered around taking a lot of pictures. In fact, I made it all the way to 9am and decided that enough was enough, I needed to take a nap in the car.

Think that was it? Ohhhh no. After prowling the mall, we then drove to Maryland for what my friends said was very authentic Taiwanese food. I'm not really sure how authentic, but it was definitely better than typical Americanized Chinese food. An oyster scrambled eggs type dish and pig intestines stuffed with sticky rice were actually my favorite dishes there. Chinese people eat some of the most interesting food.. and organs. =D

And after that, we went back to Tyson's, the Galleria this time. It was here that I picked up my first and only conquest of the day -- a shearling lined jacket in a wayyy over crowded J Crew store. It was so overcrowded that there were sales associates walking around with platters of water bottles, hoping that customers wouldn't overheat. (That was a really nice gesture though, I really appreciated that).

Before going home, we went to a Virginia shopping center and had some Vietnamese pho -- guess it also turned into Asian food day for me. I wish we had something like this in C'ville, a bowl larger than my head of noodles, bean sprouts, lots and lots of beef meat parts for $7.95. Not bad at all.

Finally, finally we started back home at 6pm, actually got home at 9pm, but managed to stay up until 2am carousing deep into the night. Oh vacation, how I've missed it. Classes start on Monday.. =( Lots of horrifying tales to come of my upcoming week. =S

reporting live from blacksburg...

*The two pictures aren't for the Tech VS VA game, they were from earlier in the semester against USC. Look at that sea of orange!

Well, not really, I think I'd get mobbed if I went to Virginia Tech dressed in Virginia colors (UVA's usually called Virginia in sports). Rather, I'm sitting in the comfort of a friend's apartment watching the Virginia VS VA Tech game after a crazy Black Friday (more on that later).

At the moment we're in the second half, just after a series of unpopular ref calls in the apartment (aka much screaming and yelling at the scream). We were all in shock when the team started Vic Hall instead of Verica, then decided Groh was crazy for not starting him as QB much, much earlier. 13,000 yards in a high school career? Really? I have to concur today that Groh is probably the most overpaid coach in college football history.

Aw, Glennon just threw the ball deep... into the hands of a Virginia receiver. Poor guy looks frustrated, back to the game.

twilight. when the stars come out.

..or the new movie that incites either extreme love or hatred from its viewers. It was my last year's roommate's birthday yesterday, so we got together for a little celebration of pizza, Chinese food and the best molten chocolate cake ever (my other second year suitemates were excellent bakers. They would be forever making bread, cupcakes, cake, etcetc.). Somehow it turned into everyone watching rerun of America's Next Top Model finale, which made the lone guy in the midst of eight girls feel very, very awkward. Of course, he would chime in with insightful comments such as "Oh, her hair looks like a nest," or "That's... just.. scary," to which we'd scream in outrage and attack him with cushions.

It was also a Maupin reunion -- everyone there were my first year suitemates, we'd hit it off really well and stuck together second year, and finally parted ways third year. I did have some friends whose roommate situation didn't work out so well first year. There was the poor petite Asian girl who had to deal with seven very tall suitemates who liked to blast music at 3 am and run around screaming at each other (not sure how the height situation happened, haha). There was the Russian guy whose roommate made weird crackling noises in his sleep. No kidding, it sounded like his bones were spontaneously breaking the first time I heard it. There was also the girl down the hall who would watch House so loudly that the RA thought someone was really being hurt the first time she heard a scream. Ahh, fun times as a first year. =P

Now that I've probably thoroughly weirded you out with bad roommate situations, here's a couple good ones. My violin playing guy friend clicked really well with his hallmates, to the point where they would have intense philosophical discussions, referring to Plato, Aristotle and Socrates at 2 am. My Jewish sister suitemate loved her roommate so much she took her home during Thanksgiving break. And then of course there was a bunch of guys in the building next to us who would have LAN parties all weekend, night, and sometimes even all day long. I'm.. still not sure when they slept, ate, and got work done.

Every summer before students arrive on Grounds, I see a lot of posts on message boards and questions thrown around about roommate dynamics and the possibility of a single room. For me, I don't want a single. College is the four best years of my life, and I want to share that with as many people as possible. There's plenty of time to be alone after college, I don't particularly want to start now. But then again, I'm a bit of an extreme case. I live in a sorority house with 20 other girls -- but there as been surprisingly nonexistent drama. With all the real life shows these days, you'd expect us to be at each other's throats about hair dryers, shower time, and who knows what. Heh, go figure. *shrug*