I'm currently sitting at work/school. I'm at my desk, eating a cheese stick and contemplating the humor in the situation. I miss my dear office mate who always had a cheese stick to share.

This cheese stick's for you.

Just an update...

I'm working like crazy to finish my thesis right now. There are days where I totally lack direction and other days where I can read and research at an incredible pace. It just depends.

It looks like the wedding may finally be on track. It's going to be a small, quick affair. Hopefully we'll have a date nailed down by the end of the week.

I'm going to have to get a new junk email address. ZipLip is cancelling their free service (which is ok because I get more SPAM there than anyplace I've ever seen).

I've been thinking about emailing people from my past. It makes me think.

Yay!

So I got accepted into my first choice program and they offered me a full assistanceship. I accepted the offer (of course). I'm incredibly excited about it.

What makes this extra exciting is that in all this confusion, there's finally something that I know for sure. At least I know where I'm going now. That's such a relief!

I am such a dork. I was supposed to cover a class for a collegue and I got confused about the time. I could swear that the class was at 1:00, really it met at noon. So I missed the class. None of the students went to the office to inquire about their missing instructor...they must have just gone home. *ugh* I never do things like that, I'm always on top of things. I must just be having an off day.

So I'm trying out this new template. I'm not sure yet about how well this one fits. We'll see. I need to figure out how to add my comments and guestbook stuff back in.

There's this guy in my office who absolutely drives me nuts.

Every office has one. You know the type that I'm talking about. That guy who steals the candy off your desk. The one who uses all your paper clips or staples without asking or even telling you that he used all of them. And of course, heaven forbid that he actually replace what he took. He wants to play his music choices. He turns on ALL the overhead lights (when you were the first one there and only turned part of them on so that the glare on your computer screen wouldn't be so bad) and when you mention that you prefer the lower light level he just looks at you and says, "Oh really?" and then goes right on without dimming the lights back or even discussing it. He opens the door all the way when you only wanted it partially open. He loudly conducts meetings in the middle of the office that you share with 3 other people. He looks over your shoulder as you type and thinks that everything is somehow his business. He gives no thought to anyone other than himself. And of course, he tells you on a regular basis how brilliant and misunderstood HE really is.

Got one of those people?

One of my PhD applications is finally finished, thank goodness. Two more to go. Hopefully I should have both of those finished by the end of the week. I'm still hacking and coughing a little bit from the flu bug I had last week. I do have to admit I'm a little bit queesy right now as well. Although that is probably due to fact that the boy took me to a Chinese buffet just a bit ago.

So, I'm still sick, of course. I think I may actually survive it this time.

My PhD applications are coming along moderately well. My biggest frustration is with my lack of a really good writing sample. Somehow I seem to have done my masters without ever REALLY writing a research paper by myself. I'm very proud of a paper I co-authored last semester, which will be included as a part of my writing sample. However, I need some work that is just mine to accompany this co-authored piece. Now that all seemed very simple to begin with, until I really began looking at the writing I've done over the last year and realized that I don't have anything that is really written as an academic piece that I like. Heck, I don't even have anything that could be molded into something I really like. I think I may have come up with two pieces that might work, although I do not feel that they are as strong as I want them to be. I believe I will send one short article reaction essay and a paper comparing my experiences with the experiences of a friend and then comparing that to concepts in the literature (which is all well and good except that the paper is therefore written in the exact opposite order that it needs to be in). *sigh* I'm just terrified that it won't be good enough. And I had forgotten exactly how low my undergraduate GPA really was until I found my transcript this morning. Whew...that was so much lower that I would have liked. Those early classes when I was the wrong major really killed me. But at least these types of programs give you the opportunity to explain those types of circumstances.

At any rate, I suppose I'll either get in or I won't. Really it is as simple as that. It's just terribly disheartening to look at the applications where they want to know things like your professional memberships (of which I have none) and your academic accomplishments and awards (of which I also have none). It just makes me very nervous.