GRE Update

So I got my GRE scores last week, and... I'm 0.5 points under the required essay score! O.5!!! It's rather frustrating, especially since I scored over the required score for the verbal section. I know many colleges will overlook a marginal difference if the rest of your application components are amazing (which I hope mine are), but I don't know if the college I've applied for does. I really, really hope that they do.

P.S. Here are some awesome YouTube series/sensations that I'm hooked on:

• Charlie McDonnell. Very funny, cute British musician and vlogger. Check out his YouTube page or his website.
• The Vlog Brothers- John & Hank Green. They created a vlog on YouTube in order to communicate with one another, as they lived on the opposite ends of the country. Go to their YouTube channel for a fun watch.
• Truth or Fail. An interactive quiz/game with a different theme every time. Created by the aforementioned VlogBrothers for fun. Test your knowledge on YouTube or at its own website.
  

PANIC!!

Tomorrow I will be taking the GRE. AAAAAHH! I'm much more nervous about this test than I ever was for the SATs. For the SATs, I was up-to-date on all my math. But now... I haven't used anything beyond basic math in years. I didn't need to. I was a writing major in college, and every job I've had since graduating hasn't used any complex math. Addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. That's it. And now I'll be taking an exam with algebra and geometry. What was I thinking?! I should have signed up for the Millers Analogies Test. There wouldn't have been any math in that.

What I really don't understand is why the GRE is necessary. Shouldn't my bachelor's degree be enough? It would make sense to take it if I'd been out of school for years, but I only graduated in 2007. Also, I'll be attending grad school for writing. Why must they torture me with math?! How will getting a good score in math prove anything about my skill and knowledge of English and grammar? If I were going for a degree in a field of mathematics or science, then it would be absolutely necessary for me to take an exam with a math element. Of course, if I were studying math, I would feel that the verbal section was unnecessary.

Unfortunately for me, the school/English department requires that I take the general GRE, not the subject-based one. So tomorrow, please say lots of prayers and cross your fingers for me. And I will do my best to remember how to breathe and how to solve algebraic equations.

Nepotism time!

Time for a shout-out for my "big brother" Randy. He just started a new blog, and I hope he will be more faithful to his than I've been to mine. Check it out. Subscribe. Discuss.

Paper(less) Trail

Yay for blogs!

Halfway There

I did it. I have made it halfway through the application process for grad school. I have accomplished the following:

1. Ordered my college transcripts from my 4-year college, not community college.
2. Filled out the FAFSA
3. Signed up to take the GRE.
4. Sent in the application.

There's no turning back now. I still have some more steps to go:

1. Order my community college transcripts.
   
2. Actually take the GRE next Wednesday.
3. Ask my professors who I haven't seen in over 2 years for letters of recommendation.
4. Write a killer statement-of-purpose essay.

I now feel only partly sick to my stomach and partly at ease. It's remarkably scary, taking this step. I got my BA in 2007, and when I didn't immediately sign up for grad school afterward, I pretty much put the idea out of my head. And now, here I am-- ready to go back to school. Back to the exams and the papers and the reading. I guess it's a good thing I like all of that.

P.S. Scrapbooking get-together tonight!!

Happy Birthday!!

This message is just to say:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JESS AND HEATHER!!!

Hope you both have awesome birthdays!

Valentine's Traditions

Hooray for holiday traditions! Even if they don't work out perfectly, it's still fun. Two of my best friends, Mary & Christine, and I started a Valentine's Day/Singles Awareness Day tradition years ago to celebrate the day of love together while we were all single. Every year, on February 14th, as long as we were in the same state, we would go out to eat and treat ourselves to delicious food. Then, we'd go to Mary's house and watch The First Wives Club, a wonderful man-bashing film.

You'd think that when one of us started dating, we'd stop having these man-hating get-togethers, but it's just too much fun. So the tradition has lived on despite boyfriends and busy schedules. We may not necessarily meet on February the 14th anymore. After all, those who currently have boyfriends *cough* Mary *cough* must spend the day with their significant others. So we still meet, on a different day, to mock the opposite sex and eat yummy food.

Our original plan was to have our get-together yesterday. But alas, none of us own First Wives Club on DVD, our local Blockbuster went out of business thanks to Netlfix and the RedBoxes outside the food stores, and those same RedBoxes didn't have it. So we met up at Walmart, hoping to find the movie there. But alas again, neither Walmart nor Target had our movie. They did have The Break-Up, so Mary bought that instead. Not quite the same, but it would work.

After purchasing our movie, we had dinner at Outback Steakhouse. Now the most interesting part of our girls' night was that Mary's brother John accompanied us. In fact, he was the one who drove Mary & Christine there. So we had a girls' + John night. If you're ever dining at Outback, I would recommend two dishes. The roast filet focaccia sandwich is the best French-dip-style sandwich ever. It's my usual choice when I'm there, but this time I tried something new. Which is very daring for me, because I'm more of a I-know-this-is-good-so-why-take-a-chance-at-ordering-something-you-might-not-like girl. But I was daring last night, and it paid off. The tilapia with crab stuffing on top was so delish!

Following our scrumptious dinner, during which we discussed the merits of Jacob vs. Edward, the ridiculousness of the Ghost Hunters tv show, and the cuteness of babies, we went back to Mary's house and watched The Break-Up. It was just as good as I remembered it being, although this time I was able to see huge similarities between Vince Vaughn's character and my ex. So our evening didn't go as originally planned, but now we've been given an excuse to have another girls' night as soon as Netflix sends me First Wives Club (which is number 1 on my list so it should only be a few days). Hooray for traditions, and for improvising!

On a side note: Oh, the weather outside is frightful! And a fire would be so delightful! But since my job's four more hours or so-- Stop it, snow! Stop it, snow! Stop it, snow!!!

Pointless post to fulfill resolution

I think the title says it all. I'm so behind on all of my reviews, but season 3 of The Pretender is calling my name!

When the Saints go marching in

How awful is it that I already failed at the "posting something every week" resolution already? Must print those resolutions and place them somewhere I can see them.

The SuperBowl was AWESOME! I'm not a fan of either team, but I wanted the Saints to win this weekend. I couldn't help it.

1. It was their first SuperBowl ever.
2. New Orleans hasn't had anything to cheer about in a long time.
3. They don't have a Manning brother on their team.

So all in all, the game worked out perfectly! I don't know why everyone likes the Mannings so much, and the claim that Peyton Manning is the greatest QB ever... really??? the greatest ever?? I don't think so. And how does his brother Eli feel about that?

Over this week, I really need to get those 50-word reviews done, because I have some new movies to review that are worthy of more than just a quick paragraph. I am currently thinking of Star Trek, which I saw for the first time last week. Amazing!

Side note: Why bother coming to a SuperBowl party if commercialism bothers you and you hang out in another room away from all your friends?

Resolutions and Goals 2010

So I've decided to make some resolutions and goals for this year, despite the fact that I usually epically fail at keeping/reaching them.

Resolutions involving The Three R's... Almost

1. I will update this blog at least once a week. Even if I have nothing more to write than - "Did nothing this week." I will write anyway in order to get into the habit.
2. I will read more. Which will of course mean sacrificing something. Writing, watching TV, or addictinggames.com and/or webkinz.com (I'm so hooked on this one game that I play it much too much). I'm thinking that it's going to be the game sites.
3. I will finally put together the scrapbooking pages that I bought all the supplies for, but never started.
4. I will continue my newest story and write 75,000 words by December 31st. If some people can write that much in a month, I can certainly match and surpass them in a year.
5. I will actually finish my application to grad school, even though I dread having homework again. And dread the loss of time that school will take up.

The Standard Resolutions I Make and Break Every Year

1. I will make it to church every Sunday, and read my Bible at least once a week. I make so many excuses when it comes to both of these, and I need to stop making excuses.
2. I will live a healthier lifestyle. Even if it means I have to give up foods I love and do the E word... exercise. I want to feel better about myself.
   
3. I will start/restart journaling. I don't think I've written a journal entry since freshman year of college. And exciting/funny stuff has happened that I've forgotten. No more of that.
4. I will do a better job at staying in touch with my friends. I suck at this, which is a terrible thing to suck at. I will make more of an effort to email/call/text/visit the people I love and care about.
   
5. Here's a new one- I will not spend so much money. I will learn to penny-pinch. I will remember that I have a Netflix account which means I don't have to buy every movie I think is good or looks good.

Short and Long-Term Goals for 2010

1. Getting accepted into a grad school.
2. Getting my teaching certificate.
3. A new car (this could be a new car or a newer used car).
4. Setting up a savings account to save up enough for a down payment on my own place.
5. The summer of weekend road trips. There are so many places I'd like to visit this year.
6. Redo my room. Paint, new carpet, and rearrangement of the furniture.
7. Throw another scrapbooking party.
8. Write a novel. It doesn't have to be perfect, but I'd like to finish SOMETHING!

There are probably things I'm leaving out, but I'll add them in later. This is already a rather challenging list. 2010 will be an interesting year.

I'm still alive, I swear!

So it's been way too long since I last posted anything. With NaNoWriMo, my job, and of course, the holidays, I completely forgot to update through November and December. (I have no excuse for January, except laziness and the very distracting addictinggames.com.)

Update on NaNoWriMo- it was a flop. I liked my story until I had to actually write it. And to make matters worse, some serious job drama came up, and I let that distract me from everything. So I ended up writing only about a thousand words for the entire month (pathetic). But that doesn't mean something good didn't come out of this. The weekend before the deadline, I was visiting my grandparents for Thanksgiving, and I decided to put aside my pathetic excuse for a story and start anew. In only a few hours, I wrote more than I'd written all month. I can only think of two reasons for this:

1. I wasn't feeling pressured to get the story done for a deadline.
2. This new story is a pet project of mine that I've been working on for years but was always too scared I'd screw it up to write it down.

So now I have to work on that story, and it's coming together little by little.

I'm also very saddened by the fact that I really didn't read much of anything these past few months. Watched plenty, but didn't read. Netflix has sucked me in, plus all those new TV shows and movies I got for Christmas. So another goal I must set myself is to read more.

There are a lot of movies and TV shows that will need to be reviewed. Too many in fact. It looks like these coming weeks will be all about the 50-word reviews. Which are soooo challenging, but rewarding. In order to say everything you want in such a limited form, you push yourself to be wiser with word choices and to cut out unnecessary fluff (which I love).

List of movies that need to be reviewed:

1. The House Bunny
2. Ballet Shoes
3. Pushing Daisies Seasons 1 & 2
4. The Fabulous Baker Boys
5. Extremely Dangerous
6. Twelfth Night
7. Glee
8. V
9. Lie to Me
10. Castle Season 1
    
11. Firefly
12. Wimbledon
13. Julie & Julia
14. Reign Of Fire

I think there are more, but I can't remember them, since they're not on my Netflix account. So much to do, and plenty of time to do it.