Tech week and finals week are the same week

And that's pretty much all I have time to say. It's pretty brutal, how little time I have to do everything ever.

Ugh

I'm sick of my suitemate's existence. I have the perfect opportunity to throw her out if I want to, but I'm not going to because I'm not a bitch like her. Essentially we've all been charged with three violations, for use/dealing, being under the influence, and knowing about it and saying nothing. I'm really only worried about that last one, but then again I've never witnessed her smoking pot in the suite, so I can't just blatantly state that she did it when there's only the smell for proof. Besides the fact that I'm only pretty sure that smell is pot, it's not like I've ever smoked it. If she gets us fucking thrown out, I don't know what I'll do.

Crazy Night

And then the campus police knocked on our door saying that our housing could be in peril if we don't stop smoking pot. But it's only that one damn girl that I don't like. We met with our RA after that (and like 2 others that she was with), and even though they took down our ID numbers, the RAs know it's not us. Essentially, if this girl does decide to threaten to kill us in our sleep, she'll be out, assuming we can report it. But we're not in danger because they know it's not us. Supposedly. Ughhhh. I hate this. We have to meet with the guy in charge of security for this building, but I have no time because I'm so busy with tech (and finals) week next week. I'm just really pissed off right now.

Suite Invasion

First of all, it's pretty awkward when people in your class are going on and on about smoking weed and how it's awkward to be around people who don't smoke weed. I just kinda stayed quiet for that. But anyway, Leah was asleep just now, and I was sitting on my bed teaching myself how to do needlepoint, when there was a knock on our suite door. "RAs on duty, open up!" There I was, thinking that someone in our suite had reported our pothead suitemate. He walked in saying someone outside could smell weed, which is pretty much always the case around our suite. Ugh. Unfortunately, or fortunately, said pothead suitemate was out somewhere when all this went down. I'm honestly a bit intimidated by her, like I think she'd kill Leah and I or something if one of us reported her.

Whoops

Sooo I realized two hours ago that one of my finals isn't happening at its scheduled time, it's happening tomorrow. Yiiikes. I mean, clearly my mind's been other places. The Yule Ball's on Saturday and I don't have a dress yet, but I did convince the guy I like to go with me since my two other good friends are bringing guy friends. Granted, he had forgotten by the next day...damn it. I mean, he's still going through with it, but that was awkward. Oh life, why are you such a problem sometimes?

Here I Sit

It's a little bit sad, how easy it is for me to waste a whole day on the internet. It's not like I have anything else better to do; I ended up stranded in Melrose until tonight, so here I sit on my clunky old laptop, typing away and watching random videos. I'm missing out on stuff at school, dammit. There's a holiday party going on, but I'm here because of a miscommunication, since I don't want to be a pain and bug someone (who?) to give me a ride to the train station.

You guyssss.

I presented my final project to the Creativity in Context class yesterday. We were told to do anything as long as it could be tied back to our classwork somehow, so everyone just played to their strengths and wrote songs/skits/whatever. I was going to sew, but then I had no idea how to relate it to class. I ended up with that scratchboard I posted to FB, because I could relate it to what we learned about George Orwell's idea of how the artistic process works. I kept it in this huge box from boots, because it didn't fit in anything else, and everyone was all curious about it. I don't really talk to the people in that class much, so I didn't really know what they'd think, but I pulled my drawing out of the box after talking for a while, and everyone was like "whoa." People even said I should start selling them! I'm seriously considering that, except that I doubt I could make much of a living as only a scratchboard artist. It was just really exciting, because that sort of thing hadn't happened to me before.

End-of-semester woes

There's only three weeks left in this semester. What the hell? Where did all of that go?

That being said, my stupid scene shop requirement is stupid because I can only go for the two hours right when it opens on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but the last few times I've tried they've been all "we don't need any help" if there's even anyone there at all. I don't want to get a bad grade just because they're not free when I am. Fuck.

I also had the bright idea of doing my largest scratchboard ever for a creative project in my Creativity in Context class, but then the sign-up sheet started getting passed around on the opposite side of the room, so lucky me only has until Friday to get the damn thing done. Don't get me wrong, I'm really happy with it so far. But I'm stressed out that I'll end up having to rush it and make it look much less pretty, because one wrong scratch and you're left with an awkward situation.

Break was super awesome and seeing you guys was so great. I'm just freaking out now that I'm back and my grades in everything are only average. I have a freaking C+ in history, because the teacher is ridiculous and his grading scale makes no sense. I can't seem to fix that, because I still never know if I've gotten a decent grade on a test. At least I'm not failing. I definitely thought that I had a chance of failing earlier, but his scoring just doesn't compute.

I'm home

And now I don't have to deal with my obnoxious pothead suitemate for nearly a week! I think that's my least favorite part of Emerson. My day was made when she was forced to clean up her pile of stuff in our shared hallway, which included an empty bottle of rum, because the RAs go through everyone's rooms and look for illegal things. I'm also excited for food. Our food's not too bad, if you know which station to go to, but I'm pretty sick of it by now. Thanksgiving's awesome!

I just spent a 3-hour class period helping to create a Batman story with shadow puppets. I love my school.

My Major

I'm finally doing things relating to it. I'm sitting backstage at a production of "As You Like It" by our Shakespeare Society student group, after being asked last-minute to be co-wardrobe assistant for a sophomore costume designer. She's also offered to let me be her assistant for the whole duration of rehearsals and such for one of her three shows next semester. Even though I'm not a real tech major, I'm going to be able to do stuff! Earlier today I was busy measuring people and pulling garments for the show that I'm assistant designing for this half-semester. Theatre kid's actually doing theatre, huzzah!

I think I was living in a bad movie

World Cup weekend. Holy shit. It's a long story, I know.

First things first. I could barely sleep as I waited for my alarm to go off at 4:15 AM. We got to our bus at 5 in the morning, and saw that there weren't too many people on our bus. We thought that all the cheerleaders would be there, but it turned out that most of them got a ride with the team last night. There were ten people from our school, and seven-ish people in a band that was playing during the cup. Bridget, the girl who was in charge of booking everything, told us after we boarded that she actually would not be coming with us. She had all the info, though, as we later found out.

Our bus arrived at the hotel at 9:50. We were told that the shuttle to Randall's Island, where the cup was held, would be leaving at 10. When we went to check in, no one knew that we existed, because Bridget had done all the booking and didn't tell us what name it was under. Eventually we found out that we only had three rooms booked for about ten of us. Okay, whatever, we could deal with that. We put all our stuff down really quickly and ran to get the shuttle. That shuttle had actually decided to leave at 9:30 with the other teams, leaving the few of us stranded. Awesome. The hotel, luckily, offered to call us a few town cars, that would hold our group and the band. There were two that held seven and one that held four. I was in the small town car, with the three cheerleaders I knew pretty well. Unfortunately, we'd already missed Emerson's first game, which they won.

When we arrived, we realized that it was freezing, and we were on a group of fields with absolutely no place to get warm. There was a strong wind, and all of us in our cheerleader outfits had dressed warm-ish but not extremely warm. I had sweater tights, a skirt, my cheer t-shirt, and a jacket. Maria, one of the girls with that small group, had footless tights. I feel really bad for her, because after a few hours I couldn't feel my feet. Emerson won their second game, hooray! Time for lunch. The two food stations both had huge lines, and we hadn't eaten in forever. So we went to the huge line for burgers and turkey legs and stuff. They had veggie burgers, so that was good for me. Two hours later, we finally got to the top of the line, and I was pretty sure I couldn't move my toes. People's burgers were still mostly raw, and I was lucky that my only issue was when the veggie burgers took an extra half hour after I paid. Then, I had to deal with my feet. A vendor sold socks, which I happily paid for in order to keep my toes. I was really freaking out, though, from lack of sleep and the realization that I was stuck there.

We still had three more hours to kill until the third game, which would be the last for the cheerleaders responsible for cooking the team dinner at that one girl's house. We all huddled together for warmth, and none of us were hungry enough to wait for two hours again. When they won the third game, we were told, we could find a way to leave since some of us were so cold. Melanie and Kelsie, the other two who were with us, weren't as cold. At that point, I was so cold, tired, and stressed that I talked to my parents about coming home early. Since our hotel was right by the airport, they decided to get me a flight on the cheapest shuttle, and I'd be leaving at 10 when everyone else did. The flight was taking off at 11:30.

After the third game, we called a town car on Melanie's phone. I think it was 5:30 by this point. They told us it would be twenty minutes, and then we'd be on our way to the hotel. An hour later, as we stood by the pickup zone, nothing was going to happen. The company wouldn't even answer their phone. Melanie's phone died, so we left them Kelsie's number just in case. Melanie talked to her dad, and he said that the company had taken an $86 hold on her debit cardAfter walking back, we talked to our cheerleading captain again, and she tried to get ahold of the guy who was in charge of the shuttle. The shuttle was not going to be leaving any earlier than 9:30, unfortunately. I'd been in tears at that point, so we were promised a spot on the first shuttle. Also, instead of leaving at 10 the next morning, the shuttle was going to leave at 7:15, so our group was supposed to eat breakfast at 6:30. Maria was so cold that she could barely speak, let alone walk.  I was staggering all over the place too, mostly out of tiredness and lack of feeling in one leg, so I couldn't really help them support her. We hobbled over to the last game at 7:40, miserable and angry. Theoretically, the game would be able to distract us for half an hour or so, but we won after just ten minutes. Crap.

Someone told us we just might be able to find a taxi if we went to the road where everyone was leaving in public transportation buses, so we stumbled over there and waited a while. When none came for half an hour, we just went along with the idea of waiting an extra hour and a half for the shuttle to come get us. When that shuttle finally came, we weren't let onto the first one. We stood out there for an extra ten minutes, just waiting.

All four of us had a lot of fun in the hotel afterwards, just hanging out and calming down a bit. At least tomorrow seemed to be okay. I'd already decided that I wouldn't be there with them, but at least we were all in better moods.

At 5:45 the next morning, their alarm went off. Again, I'd barely slept. They got their stuff together and headed out, and I couldn't fall back asleep. I think I gave up around 8 to get ready for breakfast. My phone got an email, and it was the airline saying that my flight was canceled. Immediately, I panicked. What if I was stuck in this crappy situation for the next few days? I didn't have anywhere to go. Luckily for me, there was a call saying they'd rebooked me for the 1:30 flight to Boston. I spent an extra few hours in the airport with absolutely nothing to do, but the chairs were comfy enough that I slept for a while. I'd been convinced that they would lose my luggage to top off all the bad things, but it actually worked out great from that point on. My dad got me at the airport, and took me to get real food with the rest of my family.

As for the other girls, they were at the field around 7:30, and Emerson didn't play until 3:45. Oh boy. We   lost in the second round of semi-finals, sadly. Also, those who came on the fan bus had an estimated arrival time of 2 a.m., so they're still not here yet.

Like I said, my weekend was something out of a bad movie, where the guy gets stranded and has to do all kinds of crazy things to get back. I'm going to go sleep now...it's been a while.

The Perks of Being in the City

 Josh Groban was on campus today. My friend Chris was chilling on the commons with his iPod on, and he just happened to look up at the right moment to have awkward eye contact. Apparently he even ate at EmCafe, because he tweeted about eating a sandwich. I find it hilarious that someone actually tweeted about eating a sandwich, because I remember a comedy sketch from a while ago that mentioned how nobody cared when Lady Gaga was eating a sandwich. Anyway. I've informed Chris that I'm going to be hanging out with him a lot more, because he also found Jeff Bridges about a month ago, and someone else too. I guess he just randomly attracts celebrities or something. Sadly, when Leah was filming Chris, myself, and our other friend Erin for a project just now, there were no sightings.

Crap

I just got into the Netherlands study abroad program...the one my advisor said I shouldn't do because one of the important costume design classes only meets every other year, and it just happens to be in the spring of next year. wasdcfgvbhrerewawsxcvbnpytsedrftyugihnjgoyitrueayh

Awesome Times

I went out bowling at like 10 last night, and the place was so classy. It's down by where Fenway (lolol) and the House of Blues are, and it's an 18+ bowling/billiards/ping pong thing that's pretty cool. The bowling wasn't candlepin, though, so I was a little off sometimes. The place is also a bar, but it was pretty empty, being Monday night, so there weren't drunk people all over the place. I was in last place, but it was still pretty awesome. The people I was with were talking about karaoke at one point, so maybe I'll finally get to go to Limelight again sometime.

I blew off all my homework to go, though, so today just might be a little less fun. Good thing I don't have class!

Territorial

My roommate told me that she was planning to have a slumber party while I was away last night. That's fine, we invite friends to sleep on our floor once in a while, and it's a fun time. But then she texted me that they slept in MY bed last night. I don't remember offering them that. It doesn't bug me when people sit ON my bed, but....those are my sheets. I feel like I should probably wash them again now, because that's a little weird. At least it was only my roommate and our other close friend, but still. She has her own bed, and it's in the same room. This is only the second issue I've had, so I guess I've had it pretty good so far. The other issue is that she's always asleep when I'm not and I don't want to disturb her, except I always have plenty of things to get done.

Normally it's just my unhygienic pothead suitemate that bugs me, for stinking up the suite and leaving her shit all over the hallway instead of in her room.

Noooooo

The good news: That creepier post was another friend screwing with us after she'd left the common room. Since I'd only asked her about it via text, it was easy enough for her to act like she didn't do it.

The bad news: Leah came back from the gym earlier yesterday, creeped out because some guy had been looking at her and licking his lips suggestively. It's the same guy. At least he creeps on everyone? Ugh.

Continuation of the night

There's a website we have called LikeALittle where people post about other people they find attractive. My friends, messing with me, posted this: I met you at the quidditch thing tonight... came to your floor, saw your friend in the elevator. be mine? And then, this popped up, citing my building as the location:  I was in the elevator with you tonight. I flirted with your friend...but you're totally hot too. I love Texans <3


We don't have that many Texans, and the girl I was walking with is one of them. Leah knew that a guy we know is his best friend just by description, and said friend came to our floor randomly to "use the kitchen," despite the fact that every floor has a kitchen. He stopped, talked to us for a bit, and then turned around and left. It's a trap! Apparently guys do send spies, but I don't know if it was for me or for my friend.

Weird Times at the Quidditch Promo

As you guys probably saw from my stuff, everyone involved with Emerson's World Cup Quidditch team had a mandatory spamathon. To do that, we were all at tables, and near the end we had to mix it up and sit with different people to get an even number at every table. Some random guy joined us. Here's a rough dialogue, and some after-events that weirded me out.

Guy: Hey, I'm [insert name here].
(we talked about normal stuff for a bit.)
Me: my email's down again from all the people. Damn it.
Guy: Well, what grade are you?
Me:...I'm a freshman.
Guy: I'm a transfer sophomore, so I'm in the same boat.
Me: okay...
(someone wins a tshirt for getting the most youtube hits)
Cute guy sitting next to her (jokingly): She's my girlfriend, so that shirt's mine!
Guy: No, she's My girlfriend, I want the shirt! (To me) She's not really my girlfriend. I'm single.
(people start talking about their living arrangements; I mention my dorm's name casually among the chatter)
Guy: Whoa, you live in Colonial? Which floor?
Me: the fifth floor.
Guy: No way! I'm on Four!
(I internally curse the fact that I assumed he lived off campus because he's a transfer)
Guy: Is that a fun floor to live on?
Me: Yeah, a lot of us are really good friends.
Guy: Maybe I should check it out sometime!
Me: ...

And then he offered to walk my friend and I back since we were all going to the same dorm. Luckily for us, some other girl was also heading back that way, so my friend and I just talked amongst ourselves and were able to get on a different elevator. I stopped in the common room to talk to some people, when the guy showed up on my floor. He asked me why no one was there, and I said I didn't know. I made some mention of needing to do my homework, and he left. In reality, I'd just wanted to post on here. I really should be more careful about who knows which floor I'm on.

On an unrelated note: I finally found out the name of that creepy guy with a beard from the beginning of school, because I have a friend who's in a class with him. I still see him everywhere, so that's weird. And he's forever known as Beardman, although his name was just as awkward as I'd imagined.

Halloweekend

I have to say, being at college during Halloween reminds me of a con. Seriously. People were in costume everywhere. I was dressed as San from Princess Mononoke, and lots of people just went up to me and said that they loved the movie and I'd done a great job with the costume. A lot of my friends went trick-or-treating, but my costume wasn't really suited for super-cold weather. On Friday I'd been off-campus, in Amherst, and the party I went to at Hampshire was also filled with awesome costumes. I kept seeing this guy dressed as the Joker with a green mohawk everywhere, and there was some guy dressed as Gumby. Granted, one of my guy friends at Emerson was also Gumby, so I guess that was popular this year. I spent like half an hour on Saturday night running after two of my friends with a camera, because Gumby and a Banana in Pajamas chased each other down every hall in our building. I think they should do it again in another dorm at some random time. I'm already planning next Halloween in the back of my mind, because it's just so epic when it's a full weekend.

I revoke my last post

Because, when the professor finally turned up on the second day of class (today), he blamed his absence on angry badgers that attacked him. So he's pretty much awesome. I'm still kinda not looking forward to the actual using-power-tools thing, but at least it might be fun. Also we're not being assigned hours in the shop, like I'd thought. I just have to shop up on those days before my afternoon class for a few hours and do stuff. Not so bad after all, I can finally stop worrying...for a while at least.

Work Work Work

So far, I haven't been too overwhelmed by what I have to do. I've had to write a lot of essays, but there's always time for that. And then, today happened. In my schedule, I have two half-semester classes for stagecraft, and the second one met for the first time today. It's scenic construction, which I don't think I'll be very good at. The teacher ended up not being able to come to class, but we still got the syllabus. Apparently we have to do a bunch of stuff outside of class, as in hardcore scenic work. I remember tech ed in sixth grade, and I remember how I wasn't very good with the whole power-tools-and-lumber thing. I'm officially worried, especially because I'm working on a costume project for this half of the semester as well. Also there was something about needing to work over a weekend that will be assigned to us at a later date. I can't do the Nov. 12th weekend, because I'm going to New York to be a cheerleader at the Quidditch World Cup, but I don't think that's going to be considered a valid excuse because it's extracurricular. Crap.

Quelf

I've started a trend! I went to the student symphony at MIT with my roommate and our friend, and then we didn't really want to hang out at MIT afterwards. When we got back to my floor, there were people from a different dorm baking cookies. Being college kids, we know how exciting free food is. Somehow, while talking to the people there that I didn't know, we ended up deciding to play Quelf in my British guy friend's room. He didn't even play, just did all the timer stuff. I never really thought about how that game can be a great bonding experience with people I'd only met about an hour before. Tonight, one of them brought a lot of people from her floor, so it was roughly half and half between her floor and my floor/friends. And that was pretty much my weekend so far! I'd really missed playing that game.

Swing Dancing

I finally did a more classy type of dance tonight. It turns out that my school has free dance lessons on Sunday nights that alternate between swing dancing and salsa. My roommate and floormate went last weekend while I was away, and I tagged along this time because it sounded awesome. Indeed, it was quite awesome. We had to switch people every time we worked on a new step, which was a bit of a pain because you then had to adjust to a new guy's dancing style each time. A lot of things were stuff I'd already known, but I think I'm a lot more polished about it even after the first hour of lessons. We did the whole routine (sort of) that people learned for prom, and then I'd done some of the more complicated things in the beginning of Footloose for Compilation. Granted, that was two and a half years ago, so I'm pretty rusty. I'm determined to become good at it, though.

Um.

I went to a church and a gay club in the same night. Only in college, I guess.

Somehow, I ended up knowing a bunch of the really religious freshmen on campus, and I ate dinner with them today. They were going to some church thing for undergrads afterwards, and invited two of us who aren't exactly sure what to think about the whole thing. I'll admit that the band who played wasn't too bad, except that their lyrics were apparently hymns that everyone knew. As I was sitting there listening to some guy preach about how Jesus is in everything or something, I decided that the whole experience was making me feel very Jewish. Also everyone there was talking about the "evolution theory" as if science hadn't figured out how to prove it yet. Needless to say, my other not-very-religious friend and I won't be going back. We'd just kind of awkwardly sat there the whole time.

The gay club was mostly fun. I think I like straight clubs better, because this time the only guy who went after me was about 40 and had a seriously sketchy look on his face. Gross. He came back and found us, specifically me, a few more times after I moved to avoid him. Other than that I just danced with my friends, though.

Halloween!

My friend brought up Halloween at dinner, and then somehow we came up with this idea of being characters from Miyazaki movies. She's planning to be Chihiro, and I'm going to be San from Princess Mononoke. I've now been busy planning and googling things and I can't do anything aghhhh

This just has to happen. And if it's a good costume I'll go re-use it at Anime Boston sometime. I clearly have a one-track mind, seeing as I'm only halfway working on my freaking gigantic history assignment for tomorrow. Grr.

What

Today, my lovely group of core common room-ians and I were kicked out of our own common room so a group could have a meeting. This is not the first time it's happened, and none of those people even live on our floor.

Chipotle Quest!

At the MFA's college night, there were coupons for a free meal at Chipotle if you decided to have snacks. A few friends and I decided to go to the nearest Chipotle, despite there being a heavy rainstorm. It isn't even that close. On our way there, thunder started getting louder and louder, and everyone was completely drenched. We were all wearing jeans, so that wasn't fun. We finally got to the Chipotle in question, only to discover that it was closed. Forever. The coupons expired on that day, but everyone had had enough adventures in the weather, so we miserably dragged ourselves back to campus to change and eat in the dining hall. And then, there was breakfast for dinner.

Suddenly, everything was better.

Action!

Today, I acted for the first time in a while. One of my floormates is a sophomore film major, and he just randomly asked me one night if I'd be in one of his class projects opposite another floormate. I didn't have anything to do this afternoon, so I decided to do it. The plot was about some guy who's a hoarder and an artist, whose girlfriend left him when his problems got so out of hand that he drove her away. We went to the set, along with a girl who was assigned to be a director's assistant or something, and it's this really fancy-looking apartment building. Which just happens to be my floormate's summer home. Holy. Crap.

Now for the actual filming. Film acting's a little weird, especially when it's a silent film. After setting everything up, which took a while, the fun stuff began. In the first shot, I was supposed to be encouraging him to let me help him clean up. That involved me putting a hand on his thigh, and in the first take our director friend prompted with, "Hand action!" Hilarity ensued.

We're all so mature in college. I'd definitely consider being in a movie again.

Sewing Faces

In costume construction, we're learning how to use sewing machines. I thought I knew a lot, but I don't actually know very much at all about the official way to do things. We had an assignment to draw or trace a silly face on plain muslin, and then sew said face onto it. I was terrible at it, which was a bit of a problem, until the end. We showed them off.

"It looks like a rapist!"

And thus, Chester Randall the Third was born.

The people in that class are pretty awesome.

The Club

I feel like this is a good early thing to talk about, since it's a college-y thing to do. My friends Lindsay and Rebecca had gone to some nightclub the weekend beforehand, and there was an event at a different 18+ nightclub the weekend after. They invited me to go, and I figured it might be fun. First, we didn't know where to go. We walked past this line of people that looked a little sketchy, and that turned out to be the club. So we went in, and start awkwardly dancing in the corner where there were slightly less people crowded together. Apparently the way to get a girl to dance with you at a club is to step behind her and wrap your arms around her waist...if the girl's lucky. Ick. The dancing itself actually wasn't that bad, but some of the guys were a little more problematic. The second guy was someone who I recognized as an Emersonian, and not one of the attractive ones. It was that guy who was all beard that I'd met about two weeks before. The guy that stayed with me the longest was extremely attractive, according to Leah. I don't know, I never even saw his face.

Roomie Dynamics

One time, I made a weird noise in the dark after my roommate had watched a horror movie. We left a light on for the rest of the night. I'm evil.

Orientation Madness!

Orientation was crazy. Socializing with tons of people I barely knew, trying to find common ground. I quickly learned that I needed to get everyone's numbers, or else I'd never find them again. Within a day, I had some friends on my floor, and I'd run into the few people I already knew once in a while. The great thing about Emerson is that the facebook group is still very active, and if boredom hits you can just go out and meet new people.
 My favorite event was called Hooray! Everyone went into a massive room in a hotel, and some guy led us through a bunch of icebreakers. We had to introduce ourselves to as many people as possible, and then it progressed to hugging random strangers. I remember this one awkward guy whose face was mostly beard, but more on him later. After that there was a bunch of finding a few people and grouping up. I managed to find a guy I'd met at a preview event, back when neither of us knew we were coming to Emerson. There were some people that I met who were in my classes later on, and it was just a really great way to meet new people.

College So Far

This might take a while. My first few days were pretty awkward, but I have an awesome roommate, so life's pretty good. Where should I even start to explain what I've been up to lately? I guess I'm just going general right now, followed by a few stories of my tomfoolery. I've experienced my first rejection from a theatre troupe. I'm the only kid in my major. Things have been pretty weird at times. But at the same time, life's been pretty freaking awesome.