The Mandolin?

So I ended up getting some money for my birthday. Quite a bit more than I thought I would actually. I have enough to realistically LOOK at purchasing a mandolin. I decided I wanted to learn the mandolin a while ago, but figured it would come in the future, after all the other things I wanted. Now I have enough not to fully purchase one, but I bet I could look around and I would only have to save up for a couple of months or something like that. Plus, my sweet, sweet husband said, "Well we did just get our tax returns." When I brought up the idea. I'm super excited, but here is what's keeping me from right out doing this.

1. I really want to buy a new pair of shoes to wear with my new Sunday outfit my sister bought me. Brown, leather, nice for Sunday. I haven't looked around yet, but I'm sure that would take up a big hunk of change.
2. If I get the mandolin I will really need to be serious about learning it. Yes, I would do it, but it is a pretty big commitment.

So here's the question. Are those two hang-ups justified or should I just move ahead with the mandolin idea?

So Blessed

Yesterday was my birthday and my family did what they always do. They make a big, big deal about the whole day. It's like Valentine's Day just for one person. When it is a person's birthday it is the day for everyone to tell them how much they love and appreciate them. Also, that they are happy to have that person as a part of thier life. I think more than anything that is my favorite thing about birthdays in general (not necessarily my own, although it was pretty nice). I like to make a big deal about that day for people. I like to call all day long and continually sing happy birthday.

It reminds me of when my sister and her boyfriend were with us on a family trip during his birthday. He's not technically part of the family (yet?) but we all LOVE the kid (I guess he's not technically a kid as he is older than me). So anyway, we spent the day doing things that he really wanted to do in Seattle, we went to pike place market, and to the original Ivar's on the pier for lunch and my dad bought him a hat with original "artwork" on it with something to do with ear doctors. Also we had one of those guys that make balloon animals make him a balloon hat. There were a ton of other things. We continually burst out into the happy birthday song so that everyone would know that it was his special day. I don't know if it overwhelmed him or not, my sister said he liked it. It was just good to let him know that we appreciate him and that we love him not only for who he is, but also for how happy he makes my sister.

Going back to the title of this post, I am so blessed to have a family that thinks this is important. My mom called me about 20 times my dad two separate times from my mom and my sister 2 times and my brother even sang on the voice mail for me. My husband made me a pancake cake and we ate it together in the morning. Anyway, I just wanted to say that I am so blessed to have a family that loves me so much!

Carried Away

Last night I fell in love, again. My husband and I had to go grocery shopping. We were in the car and he was singing along to his CD and we stopped at a red light. Right then he looked at me and sang the rest of the song just for me. It was some romantic song and we were sitting there in the soft red glow of the stop light and I just fell in love again. It's cheesy, I know. Later that night he turned to me and said, "You are the most beautiful woman I know. I love you." Who wouldn't love a man like that? I am so blessed! I love him bunches and bunches.

Ah-ha!

I just found out that one of my finals is optional! (Translation, I'm not taking one of my finals!) That means that for the six classes I'm currently taking I only have two finals! Only one of those finals do I really even need to study for. Man I love OSU sometimes!

Sake

I think that after graduating from Oregon State University I will know more about alcohol and alcoholic beverages than the vast majority of drinkers! My class last friday was about Sake (rice wine) and I learned all about how it is made and what is in it and why people don't like it unless it's really fresh. I'm also learning about wine and a little (very little) about beer. I find it to be very interesting, even though I'm not going to consume any of it.

Yet another reason

Today for the last lab of the term for my food formulation all we did was make our own flavored dairy blend! They just gave us all the ingredients and said have at it and the best one wins! (For anyone who doesn't know an example of a flavored dairy blend is a fruit smoothie). Our group never quite got the beverage tasting quite right. It tasted like grape laffy taffy, which is good if you're marketing it to kids. That's why we called ours pirate juice. My favorite came from another group that did a strawberry lemonade smoothie! It tasted like those italian ices. The last bit of class we got to taste everyone's! No grades, no pressure, just fun.

Wow

Well today I have gotten the worst grade on a test since I think my sophmore year. The worst part is that I KNEW what I was doing, but I got freaked out because the time and just lost my mind. I got it back today and just hung my head because it was that bad. Oh well. One week until I'm done with that class. Plus, the other two tests so far I've gotten a 94 and 82 percent. No worries.

Kitchenaid

Dear Kitchenaid,
I am very dissapointed in you. I can't believe that my mixer cost $89 to fix and still isn't even fixed! When I called your customer service line all they could say was that my problem shouldn't be happening and that something was wrong but that you could do NOTHING! I don't believe that it only had a six month warranty! I don't care what model you sell if it's going to cost as much money as I'm sure it did I don't think you should only cover it for six months! Now I can't do the one thing that I really like to do with the mixer! I should have just saved the $89 and spent it on an appliance that a different company would stand behind! Why did this happen to my mixer and not my mom's or my sister's or my mother-in-law's? What a load of crap!

Sincerely,
Unhappy Customer

The Squirrel

We live in the first floor of the apartment complex. The windows are at ground level. We have a bird feeder that sits on the ground right outside of the window. It's great. We see birds all the time. Last week I opened the blinds to see a squirrel munching on our birdfood. I tapped on the window. The squirrel ran away. I did this with the squirrel for the next hour. Finally he didn't come back again.

Until the next day.

So I moved the bird feeder to inside this bush so he couldn't find it.

He found it.

All the bird seed is gone. I was very angry with the squirrel. I spent days making sure the squirrel wasn't getting the food. I think he stole it at night. I decided to stop putting out birdseed for the squirrel.

Jump forward to today. I woke up and looked outside and there was snow on the ground. The only good thing you can say about Oregon weather is that it doesn't snow. Until now. It's the worst kind of sloppy, dripping off the trees down the back of your neck kind of snow. It melted. Then it snowed again this afternoon. The weatherman says it's going to do this all weekend.

At first I was just upset for myself. Then I thought of the squirrel. Outside, in the snow. Now there's a pile of birdseed outside our window.

Conundrum

I just got back the grade for my lab notebook. I knew it wasn't going to be that good because I actually forgot part of the way through the term that I needed to be taking notes in it. Consequently I had to go back and fill in a lot of holes. Well, my grade was worse than expected. Much, much worse. While looking at the rubric for grading (which was not handed out before the assignment, and thus I find to be a mean, mean trick) I see that I got marked down for things I CLEARLY included in my notebook. I can go through and highlight sections of included information and whatnot. Should I:

1. Go in and argue for those 8 points back, even though my grade on the notebook would still be bad. These 8 points could mean the difference between an A and a B (I don't count -/+ since that was never counted while I was growing up).
   
2. Figure that getting a B in the class is just fine since all I have to do is graduate. Let the whole thing go and ignore the headache. Plus I hate to be the person that argues for points back. It just makes me feel like a leech.

I have the remainder of the week to decide so any input would be greatly appreciated.

Ferocious

Last weekend was Vert Fest, a climbing competition on campus, which is put on by Dickson Rec. My husband, being a worker for the rock gym, was involved in setting the routes for the competition. This meant that he wasn't home Thursday or Friday.

On Thursday he was planning on going into work at noon so he could get off about 7 to study for his midterm the next day. This would have been a great plan if there were other people working with him and if the people the night before had taken down holds. Well, nobody had done anything when he got in and nobody else came into help him work for five hours. He was alone, taking down holds and putting up routes for five hours. Because of his sense of responsiblity and comittment (which I admire very much) he stayed unitl the job that needed to get done was completed on Thursday. That meant he was working until 10pm on Thursday. This got him angry because he didn't get the time he needed to study for his midterm. He called other people to come in, namely the guy that was supposed to be there with him, but that guy didn't answer his phone. So he called a girl that he works with that said the other guy had a midterm he was really stressed about the next day so he wasn't even answering his cell phone!!!!

Now hearing this of course made him angry, because he had a test the next day too, but he was in doing his job. When my husband told me this story I was immediately very angry with the kid. I think he took advantage of my husband's sense of responsiblity. That kid knew he had this midterm since JANUARY. He also knew when vert fest was. He should have planned for both. When I was talking to another kid at the gym about this he said, "Yeah, but that's (insert kids name here)." That is not an excuse! Apparently that kid is so undependable that the people around him expect him to let them down. Well, my husband got over it and went to work the next day just fine. I on the other hand sort of don't really want to talk to this kid ever again, which is a real problem because when we go climbing he's always working.

So I realize that I get very defensive of people I love. When I feel people are taking advantage or hurting the people I love I get angry and don't really like those people anymore. Well that's not true, but it really does ruin the opinion I have of them.

The other day my sister told me about someone that hurt/is hurting her right now and doing something I feel is very selfish and stupid. It reminds me of what happened to me in high school with some of my friends. This makes me very upset at this person. I realize that Kaite might figure it out with this person, but I think they're stupid for treating her this way.

Countdown

So if I discount the rest of this week. And finals week (which for me is really only finals DAY).

I only have two weeks left of this term!!!!!

Not that I don't enjoy what I'm studying. Actually this term has been one of the most interesting terms I've ever had. Ever! Next term I bet will be just as good. The real excitement is that in total I only have 12 weeks left of my undergraduate carreer! (Again not counting the two finals weeks.) I am so close to my prize! What I will do with that I have no idea, but it feels good to know that my work for the past, hmm, 16 years of my life will finally have a crowning accomplishment. I will be a college graduate! Now all I have to do is just get it done!