Nothing but Song

Feeling :  amused  Listening :  Move This Mountain - Sophie Ellis-Bextor  Reading :  A lot for this one little field to list!

Kristine is back! Show her some lurve.

So where have I been this past week or so?

EVERYWHERE!

Monday nights, I have Fundamentals of Business Writing.
Wednesdays, I have Comparative Lit. emphasizing Japanese and Latin American Lit of the 20th Century.
Thursdays, Outlaw Genres emphasizing U.S. Third World Women’s Autobiography.
Online, I have U.S. Foreign Relations.

My only complaint is how much gas I burn going from my house to old Henderson 3 times a week. Meep. I keep wanting to cry, watching the meter go down. I try not to drive fast either, and I drive a compact! That tells you how far school is away from home. *le sigh*

At least work is working around my schedule. I work loads of early shifts now, so I have enough time to get home and study. I’m really gonna apply myself this semester, I swearz.

I can’t believe I spent almost over $120 on my Business Comm book. It’s redonkulus. But it’s the only book required for that class, so I guess it’s a small price to pay. Most of my other books I can get super cheap on Amazon. Of COURSE, my U.S. Foreign Relations class has 3 required books that are uber expensive. Yuk.

I was a little apprehensive when I printed the syllabi off from WebCampus for the brick & mortar classes, but most of my fears were allayed when my professors spoke to us. I mean, yeah, they pretty much told us what I kinda already knew as that’s what happens on first days of class, but hearing it from a real, live person is comforting.

What few friends I made at school in the past few years are in most of my classes this term. It’s pretty cool seeing a friendly face or two. I’m determined not to be an evil bitch this year. I am a senior after all. I’m tempted to join some clubs on campus, but to join clubs means commitments, and I don’t really have time for any further commitments.

It’s also been a crazy week because my childhood best friend had her second son, and my brother and sister-in-law had their first, a girl. I won’t say their names or anything.

My niece M has my brother’s chinky eyes, rofl. Plus the shape of his head. She’s tiny like her mom though. But my dad also said she has our lips, from our mom.

My dad flew out to meet her on Wednesday morning. He crammed a trip back to Cali in two days. I drove him home from the airport after class tonight, and he was telling me this story about how she had been sleeping all day. My dad has this deep booming voice when he wants to assert his authority, so he booms out gently, “Hey, open your eyes.” And you know what M did? She opened them up! Then he goes, “Yeah, you know your Lolo’s voice already huh?” And he swears that she moved her eyes in response to his voice! They (my mom, my dad, my brother, my s-i-l and whoever else was in the room) started laughing. Unfortunately, nobody had a camera out to tape it. How precious is that?

My brother just posted pics of the baby on his MySpace and I’m in love.

My dad says I’m banned from hanging out with her ’cause of my “attitude problem.” It’s true that all the baby girls I’ve taken care of (N, C, and N) have all ended up sassy. They’re quick witted. They’re assertive. They know what they want. But that’s how all girls should be, I think. At least they’re not doormats!

I’m debating on whether or not to cancel my vacation that I had planned for the weekend of my birthday. My dad suggested I save it for her baptism. It hadn’t even occurred to me to save it for that! We’ve got a couple of weeks ’til the vacation. If I go in tomorrow and cancel it, I’m sure they’ll accept it. *crosses fingers*

?: “Any plans for Labor Day weekend?“

Feeling :  hungry  Listening :  Melt Away - Mariah Carey  Reading :  Stacey\'s Mistake

Update on my last entry: I got everything sorted out for my FAFSA, except how much I’ve been awarded. FAFSA Dude said I make too much to qualify for grants, but I did qualify for a loan. I keep checking my student account, and it hasn’t updated since I went to see him Tuesday. This waiting is aggravating!

Dig the new theme? I found it on WP’s site. I was gonna make my own, but I was too lazy to formulate my ideas further. I sketched some ideas out. But when it came down to coding it, I lost the will to live, haha.

This feeling is probably because I played this one arcade game the other day. I took my nieces to the Coney Island arcade at New York, New York. I forget the name, but it’s the one game where you physically duck and dive behind obstacles so you don’t get shot? It’s Japanese, I know that for sure. Anyways, my legs are still yelling at me from the ducking and diving. I love that game though. If I concentrate, I can get pretty far in it. I love the interactive element of it.

And it just goes to show me how out of shape I am. Ugh! Maybe I should join an aerobics class. I know they offer them at the neighborhood club here in my ‘hood. That’ll be a tough one to swing though, what with school and work. Doesn’t hurt to do some research right? I wish I had more space in my room to exercise. I’d do it regularly if I had more room to do my thing. It’s not that I don’t have the motivation to do things, it’s just the logistics of them all.

I opened up quite a few listings since my last entry as well. Check out my fanlisting collective, Murder on the Dancefloor, for all of ‘em.

I’ve also been trying to find a really good photo gallery script for Heaven or Las Vegas, and failing terribly. I’m test driving Zenphoto right now. I checked out their site at work today and was impressed with what I saw. I was thinking of making Heaven a photoblog, but then I thought I didn’t want to bother with it, ya know? I’d rather keep my blogging in one central location, i.e. here. So I may upload a simple photoblogging plugin, and there are a few that are compatible with both Zen and WP. So we’ll see.

And guess what? Some of my peeps on Twitter know, but my parents told me the other day that when I graduate from college, they are retiring to Hawai’i. My Kuya G is stationed there, and he has an extra room in his condo. They’re gonna rent it off him, and live off SSI. Plus me and my mom were making plans to visit everybody, meaning my other brothers before they settle into Kuya G’s place. My eldest brother, Kuya D, is stationed in North Carolina. And my little brother is currently stationed in Virginia, with plans to transfer to Italy! And he asked if I wanted to spend the summer with them! I’m like, “Srsly?” And he’s all, “Yah srsly!” OK, those weren’t the exact words, but pretty damn close. And we’ll prolly visit wherever my Ate M moves.

Anyways, I’m excited for these big plans. It’s like, I really have something to look forward to, y’know?

My plans for tonight are figure out Zenphoto, pig out on food, take a shower, slap some IcyHot on the muscles on the top part of my thighs (whatever they’re called, no wonder I got a C in Biology!), and call it a night!

I just wanted to update you all, in case people were wondering.

?: “Favourite slow jam?”

Feeling :  accomplished  Listening :  Go Ahead - Alicia Keys  Reading :  Mary Anne's Bad Luck Mystery, Journey to the Center of the Earth, Indian in the Cupboard

Why yes, yes I did.

I decided to separate Nothing but Song, right down the middle.

Nothing but Song: main site, strictly content/splash stuff. All the pages that were here? Scooted them over.

3: still my muxtape. Which was updated with songs by Five for this week. That’s funny. I’ve been obsessed with five lately, as you can see by my mixtape (down below).

blog: you’re here! Or reading it, in the very least. It’s strictly a blog now. I felt all the bells and whistles were getting to be a pain. I think it’s because the themes I were finding were so gorgeous, but it just wasn’t very “me” if that makes sense. This theme, which I’ve dubbed “The Fallen” like the Franz Ferdinand song, I just copied the files for the classic theme and then slapped some decent CSS on it to make it purty. I like how it looks. Uber stripped down.

clique: still the same.

creative: still the same.

directory: still the same.

fan: yeah, I decided to get back into fanlistings. I’m approved for 3 now, Victoria Asher, the Ghosts and Revolution in Me albums by Siobhan Donaghy.

heaven: still the same.

ost: still the same.

writing: I’m always opening and closing my writing portfolio. I dunno why. I think it’s because in its previous incarnations, I thought that more was better. But I’ve learned my lesson. Less is better. So whatever pieces I had up on Nothing but Song before, I moved them over to it. I also renamed it “On My Own Time [Write On!]“, because that is my favourite Gym Class Heroes song ever. It’s always spoken to me, lyrics-wise.

I was trying to figure out how to strip down WP admin pages as well. There’s a lot of stuff that I could do without, but I’m not sure how to get rid of it all. I saw a plugin, but then I saw a post that said you can do it without the plugin. Alls I know is I’m confuzzled. So I’m gonna do a bit more research and see what I can do. Because I will always remain loyal to WP. But I wish it was “lighter,” in terms of what I want it to do.

My mom’s in town this week, yay! We went out to dinner at Chili’s. A new one opened up in our ‘hood. And my sister started ragging on everybody again, since that’s what she does when we’re all together like that. Then, when her daughters excused themselves after we ate to use the bathroom my dad politely scolded us for talking about adult things in front of them. I wasn’t the one that started it, but he had a point.

I also made the mistake of telling my sister that our cousin was going to pay me to dog sit this weekend for her since she’s leaving town for a spell. She got extremely offended, and spent the rest of the dinner and the drive home sniping at me about the money. I guess our cousin asked her to do it first, but hadn’t mentioned reimbursement or something. So my Ate said no for whatever reason.

Then our cousin turned around and asked me and offered to pay. I took a day or so to decide, because I wasn’t sure I wanted the responsibility. But then I said to myself I could consider it a mini-vacation, since she said I could stay in the house. So I accepted. But my cousin just texted me and said it was OK that I told her.

I’m looking forward to it. Gas is gonna be a pain since my cousin lives on the other side of town, but I don’t mind. It’ll be nice to get out of the house for a few days, even though technically I’ll still be working during the day, and will have to adjust my sleeping schedule because of it. I’m gonna bring my Indiana Jones DVDs, buy some food at Wal-Mart, play with the dogs, and chill. She has the interwebz, so I’ll still be around in that sense.

Anyways, I just wanted to let you know.

?: “What is your favorite thing to do on vacations/holidays?“