Summer is almost over for me, which is exciting and scary at the same time.

I'm starting grad school, my awesome new assistantship, and I'm moving in with Chris. Eek!

So, in no particular order of scaryness:

Chris and I are moving into a townhome on the edge of town. Our lease starts August first. Our townhouse is nice; two bedrooms, two and half bathrooms, big closets, fireplace, two car garage, quiet neighborhood. And it's all only $675/month, which is right within our range. So, yay! I'm so excited to have a place all to ourselves and I can't wait to live with Chris and get to see him every day and sleep with him every night. But? OH my God, it's also terrifying. I'm worried about the money, I'm worried about our relationship, and... ugh. It's just nerve wracking, you know? It's a big step.

I got an awesome new assistantship! I'm going to be working 20 hours a week at Catholic Charities in Bloomington. My job will be a combination of the two positions that Catholic Charities was hiring for.

One position was a casework-type spot, helping young clients and their families secure Individual Care Grants to pay for their psychiatric treatment. These kids are the sickest of the sick, and the procedures for securing these grants are convoluted, complicated, and time consuming. My job as a caseworker will be to assist parents and the ICG coordinator at CC in making sure that all of the necessary information is taken, getting info from hospitals and other organizations, and compiling this info into one comprehensive case study to send off to the government for consideration. In addition to ensuring that everything goes smoothly, my work also allows parents to focus more on their child instead of on the paperwork.

The other position is doing work out in the field, doing actual clinical counseling. I'll be traveling to clients' houses with another counselor to do in-home interventions. I'll also transport clients to appointments and help them run errands, and by the end of the semester I'll be taking on cases of my own. Yay!!

And finally. Grad school. ....aaaaand nevermind, I've gotta go to work. Lolz.

I've seen this a few times now on my flist, so here goes!

( Book meme! )

I've read a lot of them, but don't recommend most. Not because they weren't like, aesthetically pleasing, but because they were boooooring. Most of the ones I've recommended were by Dickens (I've got a soft spot for Dickens) or are fairly trashy (Memoirs of a Geisha, anyone?)

I just bought by books for the first semester of grad school, and holy cow, it's so much less than I was expecting! Grand total of 129.05 is less than some semesters of undergrad!

My Theories of Personality book was only 18.99 used on Amazon, which is awesome. My Stats book I found used for *1.20!!!*, which saves me over a hundred bucks! I don't know if it's going to be the right book or not, but I've still got plenty of time to send it back and get a new one if it isn't. My DSM-IV manual was only 37 bucks, and the case studies manual was the most expensive book at 57. I already have the APA manual I need, and one of the books can't be ordered online.

So.... yay!!! I was expecting much, much worse.

I've got two interviews today, both for internship positions for next year.

I'm interviewing at Catholic Charities at 9:30 for a position as an SASS worker, doing intake and evaluation of child and adolescent clients who need public assistance. The second interview is at 11:00 at Chestnut Health Systems, for a position working in the Chemical Dependency Unit working with adult clients.

I'm very excited about both of them. :) I think I stand a good chance; I've got my awesome Baby Fold internship which gave me kick-ass clinical experience, and I've taken courses in drug abuse psychology and have studied aggressive behaviors. Either way, I think I'm qualified.

Wish me luck?

I just registered for my first semester of grad school!! Here's what I'm taking:

Psy420 Theories of Personality
Psy440 Statistics: Data Analysis and Methodology
Psy468 Advanced Psychopathology and Mental Health Diagnosis
Psy470 Legal, Ethical, and Practice Issues in Clinical/Counseling Psychology

I'm not super stoked for Theories of Personality. It's not the kind of psych that I really love and enjoy. But I'm sure it will still be interesting! Stats is (as always) kind of meh, but I'm not dreading it or anything. After writing my thesis and spending weeks doing nothing but data analysis, I feel pretty confident, lol. I'm SUPER FUCKING EXCITED for Psychopathology and my Ethics course. Psychopathology will be freaking sweet and super interesting (how could it not be?) and I've loved both of the Ethics courses that I took for my Philosophy minor. Plus, Ethics is taught by one of the professors who I met with on my interview day, and he seems really, really cool.

I'll be in class pretty much all day on Mondays and Wednesdays, for only an hour and a half on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and I have Fridays completely off. Whoo, three-day weekends! I'll probably have to be at my job at least a little on those days, buuuut still.

I'm getting really, really excited to start my new program. Chris and I are still looking for a place in Bloomington, but since we want a house instead of an apartment it's hard to do it so far in advance. If I'd known for sure where I was going back in December/January I could have gotten something easily (landlords advertise at IWU at the end of the fall semester) but it was too late by the time I decided on ISU in April. Eh, we'll see.

I'm house-sitting for Brad (my thesis prof) until Thursday or so, and then I'll be heading home. I'm excited to be at home for a few months but dreading the thought of going back to Pizza Hut. BOOOO. I'm so sick and fucking tired of that place.

OOOH, yeah. I'm thinking about going today and getting a new tattoo. :) No real reason... I just want another one.

So.... leisure time is great and all, but... damn. I'm starting to get really bored.

I joined a softball league (my team if full of physics and philosophy majors. Nerds ftw!) and we're supposed to play a double header tonight, but it looks like rain. I can't decide if I want rain or not. On the one hand, softball is something to do. On the other hand, it's softball.

1. I graduated on Sunday. Yay!

2. After graduation, my family went out for dinner with Lina's family (they're Lithuanian) and had a marvelous time. They toasted Lina and I several times (Lina's grandfather with the help of a translator) and then taught us Lithuanian curse words after a few bottles of wine.

3. My lease isn't up until the end of May, so I'm staying in Bloomington and partying for the next few weeks.

4. I'm going to grad school in August, and the program is paying for everything.

5. I'm in love with a wonderful man who will be moving to Bloomington with me, yay no more long distance!

6. The same wonderful man got me a DS for a graduation present, and I spent all day yesterday playing the new Zelda game and it is AWESOME.

7. I had a dream last night that I was in the Animorphs. I was both Rachel and Cassie at different times. The Rachel parts were fun, because I was a total badass, and the Cassie parts were actually awesome too, even though I really dislike her. We had several adventures (it was a very long dream) and it was awesome.

8. I have a movie date with Liz to watch Billy Elliot today at four.

9. My new laptop is freaking sweet.

10. Margaritas on the quad!

So, I got a brand new laptop a week ago! It's a graduation present from my parents. It's an HP and I named it Maxine. It's got Vista, which I was initially against, but so far it's been working great. The newest version of Microsoft Word is very weird and I hate that documents can't be opened with previous versions of Word without saving it a special way, but eh. That's the way it goes, I guess. It's otherwise fine.

I decided to buy an external hard drive so I can transfer my music and other files from my old computer to my new shiny. I went to Best Buy to check out what they had and was pretty disappointed to see that they were all more than a hundred bucks. They all had HUGE memory space (one had over 200 gigs, holy god), but who the hell needs that much memory space? I've only got the one computer.

But then I found one on clearance for only 88 bucks, whoo! 160 gigs for the low low price of 88 bucks, in a cool black cherry color. w00t.

I've got one class left before finals week, and then I will no longer be in college. YAY! I mean, grad school and all, but that's a whole different beast. I defend my thesis on Wednesday at 2:30, so any good thoughts you can spare would be much appreciated. I've only got one real final, and that will be over by three pm on Thursday.

I am really, actually about to graduate from college. It's... It's weird. It's awesome. It's scary.

SPORT CHIEF CAUGHT IN NAZI ORGY?

LOL

(Ok, obviously the Holocaust is not lol-worthy. Nor was it a particularly sexy time for anyone. But still. "Nazi Sex Orgy" is the best headline ever.)

http://youtube.com/watch?v=UuBm0dvIzcc

Harry Potter in the Hood. Go there-- watch it.

"When dementors are near it's like the Arctic Zone, so I puff upon the chronic till the Sorcerer's stoned!"
"I drink Polyjuice Potion when I'm in the hood carousin, doin drive by magic on my Nimbus 2000!"

omg lol

(uh, does anyone know how to post videos?)

It's been 24 weeks (six months!) since I've updated. That's fairly intense.

Um. I'm living. I don't think that this will be earth shattering news to many of you. I really either need to start being internets popular again, or just give up on this thing entirely.

...That's, uh... that's all. I guess.

Hi?

As soon as I'm done posting this, I'll be off to write the first draft of the first part of my Honors thesis. Yay!!!



(Oops. Sort of realizing that I haven't updated this rag for many moons and so you guys have no idea what I'm doing with my life. Well. Long story short, my senior year is killing me softly with its song. I've got four upper-level courses, one of which is my honors thesis. I have two jobs and I'm also working on grad school apps. All in all, I'm dying. It's fun. I'm seriously considering donating plasma so I'll have enough money for my apps.

But on the plus side, my thesis is very cool! I'm studying the effects of competition and violence in video games on aggressive outcomes. Basically, I get to design and play video games in the name of science. It's fun! Just the writing part is scary and huge.)

(And no, I'm not procrastinating. Why would you ask?)

I'm going to be taking the GREs this summer and I've been preparing for awhile now. I'm übernervous.

I got one of those practice booklets for Christmas and today I took the practice exam. I haven't really studied at all yet so it was essentially a cold run-through.

I got 57 out of 76 on the Verbal. I know that sounds terrible (hell, that would be a 75% on a regular test), but it places me in the 85th percentile. I'm fairly happy with that; like I said, I haven't studied, and realistically I have to account for people with majors that are more language-focused, like English and the other humanities. And people who major in a second language will most likely test high in this area too. So anyway, I'm pretty happy with this. I need to study analogies/antonyms and learn the tricks, and I should do the same if not better on future tests.

But the Quantitative section? I only scored in the 57th percentile!! That's BAD. That means that more than forty percent of people who take the GRE score higher than me. AAAHHHHH. My "regular test score" is only about a 71% (43 out of 60). I BUSTED ASS in math in high school. I took five years of high school math, a semester of advanced calculus as a college freshman, and a semester of stats last year. But the stupid test only covers algebra and geometry, which I haven't had in almost four friggin years. Of COURSE I don't remember it! My algrebra is pretty functional, but my geometry is incredibly rusty and I apparently suck at probability, which I never learned (seriously, we just never covered it). I need to review badly.

And the lamest damn part is that if I didn't need friggin mathematics to get my bachelor's degree, why would I need it to get my doctorate? That's ridiculous.

My combined score was 1140. I don't know if that's good, bad, or average. No one tells you these things in college.

I'm pissed, and nervous. Does anyone have test-taking strategies for me? Or can you tell me if a combined 1140 is decent? I'm freaking out, man.

I turned in my last paper of the school year this morning. Yay! I don't have to do any real work until August. I mean, I have to study for my GREs, and look at grad schools, and decide what I want to do with my life.... but hey, silver lining.

I'm kind of worried about the GREs, especially the math stuff. I haven't taken a math course since my first year of college and I haven't taken geometry or algebra since high school. The verbal half should be no big though. Does anybody have any advice for me on prepping for the big day?

Also, I've been looking into forensic psychology and it sounds really interesting as a career. We'll see!

LOST finale tonight, OMG. I was SO glad at the end of last week's episode, and Charlie totally made me cry. I don't know what I'll do until next February, whaaaaa.

So the 2008 HP Convention is going to be in CHICAGO!!!

Which means that I can actually afford to go for the first time in ever. I almost made it to the first con in Orlando but things fell through at the last minute. So OMG, I'm excited.

The one problem that I see here is that I don't have many HP friends anymore. I've fallen out of touch with most of the granger-weasley peeps (which is muy sad) and I haven't been involved in fandom in a very long time. I'll still go regardless of my intertubes popularity but a con is so much more fun with lots of people in tow and a group to party with.

I've been reading fanfic and visiting sites more often lately in preparation for the seventh book so maybe I can reintegrate myself from there? Does anyone have any tips on how to rejoin fandom? It's like I don't know where to begin anymore. I miss my small little tooby fandom.

So... I dunno. Give me your top favorite sites/archives/LJ comms so I can browse. Please!

Ok.

I don't know how to do surveys or whatever, so just respond in comments. And PLEASE respond, flist. I know I've been pretty MIA lately but I'm starting to miss you all.

Would you take a medication without doing any basic research on it whatsoever? I don't mean that you'd be unclear on the mechanisms that allow it to be absorbed into your bloodstream or whatever (god, how many people understand that crap?), but wouldn't you at least find out commonly experienced side effects? You don't need to read the entire booklet that the drug company gives you, but would you at least glance at the printout that all major pharmaceutical providers hand out with your prescriptions?

I would. Because if something funky starts to happen, I want to know if it's to be expected, if I should contact my doctor, or if it's entirely unrelated to my medication.

Rantiness:

IF YOU ARE OLD ENOUGH TO NEED EMERGENCY CONTRACEPTION, YOU ARE OLD ENOUGH TO USE GOOGLE. Learn the goddamn side effects of your fucking medications. YES, experiencing menstruation-like bleeding after using EC is PERFECTLY FUCKING NORMAL. It does not mean that something is "wrong up there," unless by "up there" you mean "your brain" and by "wrong" you mean "completely nonfunctioning."

Jesus.

(Rant brought on by a recent poster to menstrualhut who persists in thinking that bleeding after taking EC is cause for alarm, EVEN THOUGH her gyno has told her is isn't. Because since she had sex with her boyfriend last night, "clearly, the bleeding is due to having sex." Clearly, huh? I do not think that word means what you think it means.)

So my life has been incredibly stupid lately.

School: It was nice to have time off for Spring Break, but I've still got two weeks left before finals and my finals schedule this semester is really really dumb. This semester is draaaaaaaaagging.

Romance: So, Chris and I are once again on a break. On the day before Easter he told me that he thinks we're done, as a couple. I literally had to wrestle him to the ground to get him to stay and talk to me about it. Like, LITERALLY. We decided to give ourselves a month to try and change things for the better but I really don't know how that's going to help. Hopefully it will, but realistically I think it won't. Yay, another ruined birthday!

Personal: My 21st birthday is on Friday the 13th. I'm fairly excited but with that I didn't have this storm cloud of imminent break-up following me around. I am going to get drunkdrunkDRUNK this weekend. I can reaaaaally use it.

What else.... eh, whatever. I'm waiting for final confirmation about me thesis advisor and then I can get to work. I've decided that if I'm already doing a thesis, I may as well take it up a notch and do University Research Honors as well. Because I am FUCKING NUTS.

I think Chris and I have worked things out. Hopefully we'll be good for a long time now. It's a pretty long story but let's just leave it at we had a great weekend and have decided to stick it out. Yay!

What else. Um.

OH MY GOD, RIGHT. Dave is home from Iraq!!! He'll be here until the thirteenth (a month from my 21st birthday, yay). I went home on Friday, came back to IWU on Sunday, drove home again on Monday after my Neuro exam, and drove back to IWU this morning. Soooo tired, but omg sooo worth it. I got shit-faced wasted and stoned on Monday night, it was awesome. And then Dave took me to the strip club. Yeah. Gross. Chris just looked really uncomfortable the whole time. I was like, "Um, baby, you can look at the girls. I'm not threatened by them in the slightest." But he was still really awkward. The sex afterwards was great, though. :D

Um. Oh, I'm probably going to do a thesis next year. Because I'm a damn glutton for punishment, that's why. The advisor that I've got my eye on seems pretty cool. I hope that all works out!

Why yes, I am insane. Why do you ask?