I’m back on track.  For the past two weeks, I’ve been eating healthy and watching my calories.  I already feel so much better and I’m down another 3 lbs!  I don’t know why I have such huge cravings for bad food because it just makes me feel sick after I eat them (e.g. french fries, other fried foods).  I do still fight sugar cravings almost daily.  But, as long as I eat sugar in moderation, then I still feel okay.

I still haven’t got back into exercising regularly, though. I need to because I feel better when I do and I sleep a lot better, which has a been a problem the past few weeks.   Since I haven’t put a lot of effort into exercising, I’m not sure how my Skecher Shape-ups are doing.  I have noticed that my walks seem more productive when I wear them, though.  By productive, I mean I can feel more of a burn when I walk.  I’ll try to be better at exercising in the name of research.

*****

I feel like I’m in a catch-22 situation every day when I go to school.  I really enjoy walking to class because it gives me some exercise, some alone and relaxation time, I get a chance to be outdoors for a bit, and I can listen to music or an audiobook while I walk.  But, I also like to have Corey drop me off because that means we get to spend a few extra minutes together.

*****

I finally have all my midterm scores back and I’m very pleased.  As I’ve already stated, I got a 95% on my Doctrine and Covenants midterm and 90% on my Japanese written midterm.  I found out that I got an 89% on my Japanese oral midterm, and after the curve was applied to both of my Japanese scores, my written score went up to 122% and my oral score went up to 108%. The score I was dreading the most was my English midterm, but I was pleasantly surprised with an A-.  However, ironically, I did worse on the written essay questions than I thought I did and I did better on expressing the main idea of the essays we had read in class.  Go figure.

*****

I still miss reading for pleasure.  I haven’t had much time lately to even crack open Elantris, so I’m still only a third of the way through.  (I don’t think I’m going to hit my 35-book goal this year.)  It’s killing me not to know what’s going on in Elantris!  But, I’m being responsible and doing my homework instead.

Luckily, I have had some non-thinking type projects to do at work lately, so I’ve been listening to audiobooks.  I finished Twilight a few weeks ago, New Moon a couple of weeks ago, and I’m listening to Eclipse right now.  I’ve decided that I really enjoy listening to audiobooks because I can still satisfy my cravings to “read” my favorite books without them pushing books I haven’t read and want to read farther down my to read list.  Also, the readers do such a good job at reading with emotion and animation that they bring the characters and story to life.  Audiobooks are so much better than movies made from books because you still have all the elements that make you love the book.

*****

I joined and added Google Friend Connect to my blog.  Join or die … er … join if you want to know when I’ve made a post. It’s near the bottom of my sidebar, under my shelves.

A couple of my friends post random ramblings every now and then and I thought it would be fun to give it a try.

Because of my last post, some of you may be thinking that I’m not enjoying school.  That’s not it at all.  I absolutely love school.  I enjoy every minute of it, including the homework and tests.  I just hate trying to decide what I want to do with my life.  I’d rather go to school just to go to school.

*****

I feel like I’m not doing very well with any of my goals this year.  I just can’t seem to get my head in the game.  I keep giving myself permission to slack off (not in terms of school).  I really need to focus and get back into things because I felt so much better when I was following my goals.

*****

One of the things I miss the most with my crazy schedule is reading the things I want to read.  I’m doing plenty of reading and I find the essays my teacher assigns interesting.  I just miss reading for pleasure.  (I never thought I’d say that when I was younger.)

When time allows, I read a couple of chapters of Elantris by Brandon Sanderson.  I’m nearly through a third of the book.  I’m really enjoying it and I want to know what happens.  I wish I could read it more often. Oh well.

*****

Midterms are here and I get to take a midterm for all three of my classes on Monday, so I’ll be studying my heart out this weekend.  I’m not worried about my Doctrine and Covenants midterm because it’s not cumulative.  It’s just the second test in the class.  I think I’ll do okay on my English midterm, but I’m a little worried about the essay questions.  I hate essay questions with a passion!  I’m most worried about my Japanese spoken midterm because I don’t feel like I’ve had enough time to devote to Japanese.  I’m sure I’ll do fine because I’ve been doing great in class.  It just freaks me out a little bit.

*****

I handed in my research paper for my English class yesterday.  I chose to write about the frustrations of being left-handed.  It was really fun to research this topic, although I could be biased since I’m left-handed.  Still, I look forward to seeing how I do on this paper.  I think I might actually pull off an A.

Corey is quite literally a jack of all trades.  He can learn how to do something and be good at it without even trying.  It’s nice to have such a handy husband.  And, at the same time, it’s discouraging because I don’t feel like I’m really that good at anything and I feel like I’m sub-par compared to him.

I know I have talents.  I can crochet, knit, play the piano, learn foreign languages fairly easily, etc., but I don’t feel like I’m really superb at any of these things.  Yes, I do realize this could just be my self-esteem talking.  But, when I really stop to think about it, I don’t think I’m that good at any one of these things.  I can read crochet patterns like nothing else, but I can’t make up my own patterns.  I can play the piano, but I’m not a very good accompanist or I could never be a concert pianist.  I pick up on foreign languages really easily, but I’m not fluent in any of the languages I’ve been exposed to.

You may be wondering what brought on this train of thought.  Well, I’m trying to find my passion.  I think it would help me while I’m going to school.  I’m still unsure of whether getting a Bachelor’s in English is the right step for me.  I plan to stick it out and give a few more English classes a try because I don’t want to base my decision off of one class.  However, I don’t have a lot of leeway anymore to try different things.  I’m technically a senior with 95 credits for crying out loud.  But, those 95 credits aren’t really in any one particular subject.  My Associate’s degree doesn’t even have an emphasis.

There are a lot of things I enjoy doing, but I’m not sure if I want to do them for a living.  I love figuring out why people work the way they do, so psychology could be a good way to go.  But, I know I wouldn’t do well listening to other people’s problems all the time.  I’d get depressed and take their problems on as my own.  I love to read and that’s why, at this point, I’ve chosen to become an editor.  I’m only second guessing myself because I don’t have a passion to read like a few people I know.  They devour anything with words on it: cereal boxes, newspapers, Internet articles, books, etc.  Whereas, I only devour things that interest me.  I don’t do well being forced to read something I don’t want to because I just won’t do it.  Is an editor really the right way to go then?

I don’t feel like I was given enough direction when I was growing up, either by my parents or by my teachers.  I don’t feel like I was prepared for the real world.  The only thing my parents instilled in me was a passion to learn.  That’s why I’d rather go to school just to go to school.  I never really gained a good work ethic.  It’s only my perfectionism that keeps me going at work.  But, honestly, that only gets me so far.  My teachers didn’t really push me in any one direction either.  I was good at math (I had a theorem named after me in high school) and I was good at foreign languages.  So what, though?  None of the professions in those fields sound interesting to me.

This post is turning out to be quite the novel, so I better wrap up.  I hope I can find my passion, find something I’m good at, find something I want to do or be, etc.  Hopefully, I’ve made the right decision with graduating in English.  I guess only time will tell.

Yesterday, my financial aid finally came through! I was able to pay this semester’s tuition and register for Spring and Summer terms.  I feel like a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders and it’s such a nice feeling.

I’m in the process of applying for financial aid for Spring and Summer terms.  Luckily, it shouldn’t be as big of an ordeal as it was for Winter semester because they’re part of the same year which has already been approved.

In a few weeks, I’ll begin the long process of applying for financial aid for next year and that’s what I’m not looking forward to. But, on the up side, our taxes will be fixed and we’ll have new taxes to go off of for next year.  So, I shouldn’t have as much trouble with next year’s application process either.  It seems like things will be less of a hassle from now on.

I handed in my first essay in ten years last Thursday.  I was very nervous about it because I hadn’t written one in so long and I feel like my creative writing skills have gone kaput.  But, with the help of a few friends and the BYU writing lab, I was able to write a fairly decent essay. Or, at least I thought it was fairly decent.

During the semester, my teacher wants the class to focus on ourselves, meaning, with the exception of my research paper, I’m required to write about me. Normally, I love to write about me as evidenced by my blog.  But, for some reason, an assigned topic about me seems scarier.

For my first essay, I was supposed to narrate an important personal experience.  In that narration, I needed to explain the meaning of the experience and I needed to make the experience real for the reader.  The hardest part for me was trying to pick an experience.  I feel like my life is so boring and that no one wants to read about it.  (It’s kind of ironic that I feel like that since I have a blog. )  I ended up switching my topic because I didn’t think my first topic was very compelling and I thought the second topic fit the purpose of the essay more.

Yesterday, my teacher handed our essays back.  I was surprised at the grade on mine.  It was a B-.  I know a B- isn’t bad, but I wasn’t expecting it.  I knew my essay didn’t deserve an A, but I thought it deserved at least a B or B+.  I’m not disappointed; I’m just shocked.  After reading my teacher’s comments, though, I understand why my essay received the grade it did.

I agree with most of my teacher’s feedback on my essay.  (If you want to read the essay, click the link to view the pdf or click the images to enlarge them.)  However, I think some of his feedback is more preference than an actual need for change.  For example, his first comment is “nutritious?”  Honestly, at that time in Corey’s and my life, nutritious wasn’t a determining factor for food.  That’s why I wrote what I wrote.  Also, he told me to name the item that we were charged for by mistake.  I didn’t remember what it was, so I thought I came up with a clever way to refer to it.  Obviously, he didn’t think so.

I think my second essay, which is due tomorrow, will be much better.  First, I know what to expect from my teacher now.  And second, I worked very hard to implement the feedback from this first essay and I think I’ve done a pretty good job.

PS – My teacher said there was one student in the class whose essay was riddled with comma splices.  I’m very proud that he didn’t have to correct my grammar or change my word usage (other than when I called the extra item a stowaway).

Wow!  Two posts in three days!  It’s almost like my life is back to normal.  I assure you, though, it’s far from it.

Financial aid is the worst!  Trying to jump through government hoops to get help couldn’t be more complicated.  I’ve been dealing with this forever-long process since last September and I still don’t have financial aid!

When I realized I was going back to school this year, I started the financial aid process.  I handed in my FAFSA application, tax forms, etc.  During this process, Corey and I noticed a large discrepancy on his 2008 tax form.  Corey does our taxes by hand, or I should say by tax software. He was advised to file our taxes separately for 2008, which was the first time since we were married.  He figured it would be a similar process, though, and decided to still do it himself.  (I would’ve done the same thing if I were in his shoes.)  Somehow, my income was not only entered as my income on my taxes, but it was entered as Corey’s income on his taxes too.  Needless to say, that error makes it seem as though Corey and I made double what we actually did.  As you can imagine, that’s not good when you’re trying to apply for financial aid.

When Froyo closed, Corey and I didn’t think I’d make it back to school so I decided to stop pursuing financial aid.  Then, in December, everything worked out for me to go back and I started to process my financial aid again.  At that time, I let the financial aid office know that Corey’s taxes were wrong.  They told me to submit a copy of my W-2 and a letter explaining the situation and everything should be hunky dory.

On December 28, I heard back from the Financial Aid office stating that they couldn’t do anything about Corey’s taxes because legally that’s how they were filed.  That made sense, but I wish the adviser had told me that in the beginning, so I didn’t waste two weeks finding it out from someone else. I sent them a message asking what my next course of action was and I asked them if I would still qualify for loans, even unsubsidized ones.  I just heard back from them this week and I still don’t know anything! The person who answered my message didn’t even read it.  They just told me to come in and talk with an adviser to get an overview in the process.  I’ve already talked to an adviser (I mentioned this in my message) and I know the process.  Look where doing those things the first time got me! Absolutely nowhere! Ugh!

At this point, I need to talk to an adviser again and try to get this resolved before March 1, so my financial aid can pay my short-term loan back.  If this doesn’t get resolved, then I may not be continuing passed this semester.

I feel like screaming at the top of my lungs, “Can something just please work out with out a lot of falderal?”  I know these experiences are supposed to help us grow and become stronger, better people, but they’re still frustrating, overwhelming, and very discouraging.

In the post Coming Up for Air, I mentioned I had bought several school supplies that make me more purple than the Purple People Eater. My sister-in-law Jen suggested I post a picture of me in my purple glory.  I’m always happy to oblige such requests.

You can just barely see the purpleness of my shirt and my backpack.  I’d take another picture that shows them off more, but sadly, this is the last picture that will ever be taken with my digital camera.  Corey accidentally dropped it after said picture was taken and now it won’t work.  It was a very old hand-me-down camera, so I think it’s time for a new one anyway.  Hopefully, that’ll be sooner rather than later and luckily, you get the point of my purpleness.

You can also see the awesomeness that is my lefty notebook. (It’s behind the planner.)  I’m not holding it upside down.  The spiral is, indeed, on the right side!