My Addiction

I'm pretty sure this counts as one.

For years and years, I smoked. A lot. No, seriously. A LOT. I hardly ever do now. But sometimes I still really want to. Just for the sake of seeing that cigarette in my hand and smelling the scent of smoke. It's been so long since I smoked regularly that I've "lost that lovin' feelin'." Seriously. It happens.

Now, on the rare occasions when I do smoke a cigarette or two, it's just a lot of lightheadedness, not much of the happy, and a gazillion times the guilt.

Lately, I've been stressed. Y'all can probably tell just by reading the stupid shit I write. And sometimes I really wish that smoking could be a familiar and comforting thing to touch bases with again. I know it's ridiculously unhealthy. But there's nothing in my life right now that can help ground and relax me as much as smoking did just half a year ago.

It alienated me from two particular people I couldn't stand to be around anyway. It gave me some quality time with a few people I did care about. It kept me awake when I needed to crank out some study-age (kind of like what I need to be doing right now). What the hell... cigarettes kept me company when I didn't want to talk to anyone, but didn't want to be alone either.

It'd be nice to have that back. I feel like I've lost a part of me.

It's also 2 am, and I'm pining for a bad habit. I'm retarded.

My Titration

Didn't go to 8 am class.

Not going to 9 am class.

Don't plan on going to work at 10.

I just don't want to do anything. I don't want to do my reading or my homework or my paper. Or study for my midterm tomorrow. I don't want to get up to brew coffee, and I don't even plan on getting dressed until there are people around besides my apartmentmates.

I want all my problems to solve themselves because I can't find a way to solve any of them on my own. I wish I could take back every stupid selfish rant I've ever written and quit depressing everyone around me, both in reality and in cyberspace.

I'm going to flunk this quarter. I've already managed to alienate my friends. And considering all these days I've been calling in sick, I wouldn't be surprised if I lost my job as well.

I wouldn't be surprised if all of that really did happen. In fact, I'd be surprised if it didn't all happen. For all of you who don't already know, life tends to shit on me. I've been averaging around a death every two months, so it looks like I'm not due for another death until late November, give or take. So something else has got to give between now and then.

Crumble, Jennifer. You're already starting to. It's like an acid-base titration. That phenolphthalein is all there, just waiting to turn fuschia. You see little glimmers of pink with every drop from the pipette, but everything still looks clear so far. You know that one of these drops... it's getting closer and closer... is going to turn the whole damn flask pink. It's just a matter of waiting. And watching.

One drop? Fifty drops? All I know is that I'm right on the threshold of losing it and be it tonight or two weeks from now, I have no way to judge. All I know is that my tolerance for being alive is almost gone.

I hate life so much right now.

My Fuckin Shit

I hate myself so much right now I wish I could just man up and just fuckin kill myself already.

Fuck papers.
Fuck midterms.
Fuck a cappella.
Fuck life.

Just fuckin' fuck this shit. I wish I could do the whole goddamn world a favor and just die. Piece of fuck.

My Musical Mayhem

First and foremost, I apologize for all emo-ness. I'm not going through one of my better phases.

I skipped Genetics lecture for the first time today. Yes, I lost participation points. And yes, I probably missed some important material. But at least it's podcasted.

I stayed up for a long time trying to remember a bunch of terminology for the BILD3 midterm I had this morning. I hate lower division classes for precisely that reason. I don't want to have to define "synapomorphy" or any other stupid shit like that. Isn't it enough that I can perfectly understand the material and use the word in context?

Regardless, I believe I made a moderate killing. I didn't study enough to really guarantee myself a spot at the top of the curve. But I do think I did myself a solid 95. At least. Unless my definition of a "paraphyletic group" was not to my dear professor's liking. In which case she can just suckkk on that.

On to some issues not directly related to, but definitely correlating with my slumping academic performance. I'd kill for some stress relief right now. What a statement.

Today I held a casual lunch meeting with an ex-boyfriend. We broke up last November, and today was the first time we really talked since then. It went very well, actually. But even though the air between us has been cleared, that doesn't solve any of the problems that have really been eating me up.

I'm still distracted. I still desperately crave a cave made of blankets and pillows and maybe a puppy or two. And my mommy to reassure me through the breathing hole. And to pass me comfort food through there too.

As much as I hate to admit my mistakes, I was very mistaken when I believed that academia could satisfy me. Music is still very much the core of everything I do. It's half of my academic life too. The Tritones, past and present, and my 5 apartmentmates (one who IS a Tritone) are pretty much the extent of my social life.

1. The only thing I compulsively spend money on is music. I have an Excel spreadsheet to keep track of the CDs I own.
2. The only thing I do in my spare time is music. I arrange music, sing, and play the guitar. Or I get drunk, sing, and play the guitar.
3. The only thing that has been keeping me sane is music. I listen when I'm happy, sad, angry, frustrated, and everything in-between.

I thought I'd share what I've been getting into lately: Monkey: Journey To The West
I've had a lot of acoustic soul in the mix too (JUSTIN NOZUKA) for the times when my life needs a little bit of sexiness incorporated, because it's not getting incorporated in any other aspect of my life. I'll tell you that much.

My overall well-being corresponds to how music and I are doing. Music is my life... and I've never been so sick of just being alive.

My Achilles' Heel

This is it. This is where my limit is. I can't keep this up.

This blog has primarily been about my academic and work-related doings. I've tried to keep the vast majority of my personal problems out of this site. But it's all escalated now to the point where my academic and work-related doings are affected by my emotional dysfunction. It's been a lot of turmoil, especially for the past week and a half or so. I've taken some beatings. And I've humbled myself for the sake of preserving the peace in my relationships with people.

But I'm straight up tired. I can't concentrate on my studies, and I think of nothing but the troubles plaguing me. I don't think I can take much more before I just give up and surrender myself to the apathetic mediocrity creeping over my shoulder.

I suppose my greatest weakness is emotional investment. Mixed with my tendencies for perfectionism and extreme competitiveness, I'm doomed to have my hopes smashed.

What I had always hoped would be the highlight of my college experience has proven to be my tragic flaw. It's too much. I hate to face the fact, but the truth is plain to see: Tritones will be the end of me.

My Manic Monday

Today feels like it took way too long to get through. I actually have class in six minutes. I'm not going.

Slacking is starting to settle in. It can't be prevented. After another long Sunday night, I find myself without the willpower to trek on. I don't have it in me to burn the midnight oil learning evolutionary thought, so my only option is to finish studying for my midterm within the next 5 or 6 hours rather than attend class, and hopefully sleep my weariness away before my 8 am moment of truth.

I wasn't even in the mood to go to ochem this morning. I just stayed in bed and watched Good Morning America. Then I shuffled my ass around at work, and forgot to turn on the fume hood before filling syringes with carbon tet. If I get liver cancer sooner than I expect to, we'll all know why.

This entry probably isn't very interesting to read. I'm pooped. Over it. All I want to do is go home and go to sleep with Leia warming my feet. No more school. No more work. No more a cappella. Just no more, please.

My Wild Night

We had sake-sampling in my apartment last night. In addition to several varieties of sake, which we bought in bulk at Ranch 99, we also had plum wine, which is notorious for wasting people of all ages. My friends and I used to drink the stuff at family friend get-togethers when we were in elementary school, and then we'd all fall over while trying to play Mario Kart.

Among the five of us present, we downed two giant bottles of sake and a bottle of plum wine. It was ridiculous. I was hungover this morning, but I am now enjoying Breakfast 2.0 after my first eating attempt got me to puke up my life and lie in bed watching A Knight's Tale on TBS.

So... about the whole being a student deal, I don't know how much I'm going to be studying today. We have a pre-rehearsal dinner party planned, and that's at 4, so I'm pretty short on time here. Thankfully, I did manage some productivity yesterday, so I'm not completely screwed over. My midterm isn't until Tuesday, and I can make time to study tomorrow. I think I'll just do some light reading and notes-reviewing today.

After all is said and done, I generally do work very hard, and there's no harm in letting loose once in a while.

Social life: 1
Studies: 821782974893

My Anti-Climatic Weekend

I've been up since around 7. And I've accomplished very little. I made coffee. Listened to the electronic opera I finally got in the mail yesterday. (BTW, it's amazing. Gorillaz's Damon Albarn's "Journey To The West," credited to Monkey. Seriously good stuff.) I'm weird. I like experimental music.

On to school stuff. I still have midterms next week, so this really isn't a weekend for me to fool around. Damnit. I'm craving one of those do-nothing days. Sadly enough, once I finish this post, I'll be off to outline a couple chapters in my textbooks. Catch up on some reading. Work some problems. All that jazz.

I have a performance commitment this afternoon at 4:30, and a rehearsal tomorrow night at 6, so I'll have to budget the little time I have, because the temptation to waste it will be overwhelming. I can tell already. I'm restless. And I haven't even sat down and started studying...

What I hope to accomplish today? I don't think it's out of my capacity to outline, study, and lock in 2-2.5 chapters of evolutionary thought. Two chapters is my bare minimum requirement for the day. If I finish 2.5, I can take the rest of the day off.

Ready? One, two, three, BREAK!

My Almost-Weekend

Having a busy Friday is such a bitch. It's like... "Here's a pie. But you can't eat it unless you run four miles and jump through a flaming hoop first." The weekend is nearing, but I've got a mini-midterm to study for and take, as well as a good chunk of genetics problems to solve before I can really relax in weekend-mode. Bitchhhhh.

Fifth week is quickly approaching, and I'm getting at that part of the quarter when I start to really really miss being at home. So I remedied that this morning by cooking up a huge pot of Taiwanese porridge, which I served to my fellow apartmentmates (and one apartmentmate's plus one, who also happens to be Taiwanese) with some pickled cucumbers and bamboo roots, pork sung, and salty duck eggs, all MIT. 1: Because I don't trust anything made in China. 2: Because Taiwanese food should be made in Taiwan.

It did somewhat cure my homesickness to eat food that I used to eat every day. But to really get a full dose of home, I checked one of my favorite blogs in the world, My Mom Is A FOB. Really. It's magic. It's total déjà vu reading some of the stuff other Asian moms write. I could swear that I have loving-lecture e-mails from my own momma that are nearly word-for-word on that site.

What I'm resolutely traipsing around is the fact that I skipped class this morning. I'm still sort of sick, and I was seriously craving some comfort food. What's more than that, I feel like my organic chemistry lectures are completely useless, and I've thus stopped attending. It's justifiable. My absences in that class are not due primarily to sheer laziness, but rather to the fact that attendance does not affect my performance, and that the whole shenanigan is a huge waste of time which could be otherwise dedicated to actually learning something.

Good reasoning, truth?

I am going to discuss one last thing before I continue with my day. Right now, I'm about a third of my way through midterms, and I'm looking good so far.

CHEM140A (organic chemistry): Total ownage. On my part. I did very well for myself in that class.

BICD100 (genetics): I got 200/200... but there was someone who ended up with a 214/200. I should be satisfied with my performance anyway. I wasn't feeling too awesome that day. Plus the class average was about 64%.

MUS15 (popular music): Full credit on my first midterm paper. Can't ask for more than that, can I?


I'm doing well so far. But the temptation to start slacking is ever-increasing, and I feel like I deserve a break. Too bad... I've got another midterm on Tuesday and a paper due on Wednesday. Can't stop now! Gotta keep truckin'!

My Relapse

I had to skip class this morning. I woke up at 6:30 and just could not find a way to drag myself out of bed. As in I was physically incapable of getting out of bed.

Thankfully, lying around for several hours helped. I am better now than I was earlier, but the fact is that my road toward recovery has regressed a little. I'm hardly any different from how I was on Tuesday night.

Needless to say, I skipped my lecture this morning, losing precious participation points in the process. It was a tradeoff. But if I were to collapse and die this morning in the process of dragging my sick ass to class, I'd lose the participation points for the rest of the quarter too. And that is no bueno.

I'm still debating if I should drag my ass to work... it's really far... And I'd rather not walk anywhere. Maybe I'll take the shuttle or something. Ughhhhhhhhh.

My Last-Minute Paper

In hopes of recovering fully by today, I went to bed before 11pm last night, and got nearly 8 whole hours of sleep. Unfortunately, I'm still not functioning at 100%, but I'm still steadily improving.

Anyway, that left me in kind of a dilemma. I had a paper due at 9am this morning, so not staying up to work on it last night left me a little less than two hours to write the paper, print it up at a student computer lab, and turn it in at section. But I did it. I cranked out a paper in a little less than 45 minutes. And it was amazing.

It's one of my shittier essays, but considering it's a pass/no pass assignment.... I'm pretty sure I'll be alright.

Yea. I'm at work right now. I should probably get back to work. Or at least pretend that I'm doing something productive.

My Studious Success

I've accomplished a lot today. I feel like I really know my genetics. I'm going to absolutely DESTROY tomorrow. Gonna make a killing of that class.

I think I made a semi-killing this morning at ochem. There was some stuff I wasn't expecting to be expected to know. (What a weird sentence!) But at least I knew my shit. Not gonna lie, I lucked out. The one pKa value I happened to know off the top of my head...

I'm ready though. And that makes me happy. I'm still going to do some hardcore reviewing, but I am thoroughly confident in my understanding of my genetics course thus far.

It gives me such a sense of satisfaction to have this feeling of total and complete understanding :)

It's moments like these that make me so thankful for education. I love being a student during these Hallelujah chorus episodes. They're rare, but when they happen...

Worth it.

My All-Nighter

Rehearsal today ate up a lot more time than I thought it would. It ended with a late dinner with some 'tones, which somehow morphed into a bitching session that I left shortly thereafter. My departure then turned into a chance bumping-into of this year's directors, which led into a full-blown discussion on how to fix this year's group.

I can't believe we're having issues already. It's stressing me out more than I wish it would. I'd like to say that it's detracting from my ability to focus on other things because I'm so angry. But that's pushing it a bit far.

Long story short is that if I'm going to perform at the standard I usually hold myself to, I'm going to have to pull an all-night deal here. Goodnight blog, hello books.

I toast you guys, RedBull in hand. Here's to an A in 0chem.

My Crunch Time

I could not study yesterday. I tried with all my might, but fevers and headaches aren't generally conducive to the learning process.

Today, I am actually feeling much better. I'm still sporting this beautiful hacking cough that hurts like a mofo, but my headache has definitely subsided to the "I lack caffeine" level, as opposed to the "quit whacking me with bricks" level from yesterday. I can be productive today.

I guess yesterday was good in its own way too. I played so much guitar that my fingers now smart whenever I wash my hands and I get pins and needles in the tips when I type. It's not painful enough to really bother me. I think of it as the satisfying aftermath of accomplishment. At least I got to make some music in place of learning o-chem.

I plan to pop some laundry into the machines, and do reading and practice problems. That's my general plan of action anyway. I should hop to that, because rehearsal tonight is going to eat up some of my time.

Only three chapters will be covered on my first midterm tomorrow. Shouldn't be too difficult to learn in time... I think... I hope...

My AKKHHHUGHH

There's a cold going around the campus apartments where I live. Guess who has it right now. Aren't I a lucky one?

It's not very fun to be sick while trying to study. That's probably why I'm not studying, and instead writing about how sorry I feel for myself when I'm trying to study sick. And listening to Justin Nozuka. His voice is like medicine.

Kidding. His voice enables me to feel even more sorry for myself as I pine away in my sniffly singleness. I could really use a boyfriend to sing to me and make me feel better. Slash keep me company while I cough myself within an inch of my life. All the while trying to solidify molecular orbital theory.

I'm kind of hoping I feel better soon. This being sick business is starting to chip away at my willpower to overcome mid-quarter slacking...

My Academic Apathy

I'm writing right now because I don't want to study. I'm tired of being cooped up in a stack of texts and notes, jamming my neuropathways with a ton of marginally useful information. Sometimes I stare at my notes and think to myself, "Why am I trying to learn this shit?"

It's tiring! You'd be surprised how exhausting it is to be truly hardcore about academics. I work damn hard for a spot at the top. At this point in the quarter, I'm working to get over the first hill. Midterms, round one. I've got one under my belt, two more plus a paper next week. I just have to grit my teeth and power through this next week. If I don't do well on my midterms. that just creates more stress for me come round two, right?

And stress is no bueno. I'm working. I am. I've got some reading to do before a quiz at three... maybe I'll hop to that. Lord knows it's a better idea than bitching out frustration on a blog...

"My Super-Massive Pain In The...

parietal regions of my cranial cavity.

I think it might be the caffeine. For some reason, I just could not sleep properly last night, so I tossed and turned for hours on end, and when I finally timed out and had no choice but to get out of bed at 6 am, I was struck by an incredible urge to fall onto the ground and sleep. Hence, I am a little over-caffeinated. That's my explanation.

Parking spaces to fight over, lecture to attend, work to do, rent to pay. What else is new?

Due to my lack of sleep, I have achieved maximum lack of productiveness this morning. No coloring, no homework, no thinking, even. I drove to the VA, called my mom while walking to Geisel, and bummed on a Geisel computer until now. Actually I'm still bumming. So far definitely not one of my more fruitful days. In fact, I have a feeling I'm going to sleep through an hour and a half of lecture, zombie myself around the VA, skip out on setting up my work schedule for EXPRESS, postpone the cleaning I had planned for today, and forgo dinner in favor of a hardcore sleep sess.

It's my first lazy day in a long while. I don't know whether I should be excited that I'm going to take a real break or sad that I'm truncating my unrelentingly hardworking streak. The more I think about it, the more I figure that I'm going to guilt myself into pressing on for a productive day. I mean, I've done so well for so long. It'd be a pity to let that all go to waste over a few hours of lost sleep. Great.

I take back everything I wrote. Yes, I've been grossly lethargic for the first 3 hours of my day so far, but I have time to turn it all around and make this Thursday a win. It just feels so much better to end the day know I've achieved something that I'm just going to have to persevere for the next 15 hours."



End quotation. That was something I posted on Thursday, July 17, 2008. And it sums up right now pretty well. I don't know what it is about approaching the middle of an academic quarter, but it's always when the lethargy starts to kick in!

Long story short, this morning I had a fire drill early in the morning, and a nap all through Evolution lecture. Whoops. All in all, not one of my more productive days. I'm sipping on a pomegranate-flavored Rockstar, and my fingers are definitely feeling it.

But I'm going to press on. I figure... even if everything I accomplish today is a product of guilt, at least I will have accomplished something. The end justifies the means, right?

On a brighter note, I did purchase concealer last night, so I no longer look like a zombie with my under-eye shadows in all their glory. Concealer is magic. If you don't look too carefully at me, it almost looks as though I still have a soul...

Who am I kidding? I sold my soul for straight As.

My Fire Week Episode II

I learned from my friend's blog that SoCal is indeed on fire once again. This marks the anniversary of a lot of things. If my first college boyfriend and I had made it past the three weeks we were an item, right around now is when we would be celebrating our first anniversary. It also happened to be a week of utter boredom that resulted in some personal experimentation that I won't reveal the details of on this site...

Strangely enough, right around now is when my ex and I are actually starting to hold civil conversations with each other again.

"Fire Week" last year, the week when school got cancelled, would also mark the point in Fall quarter of last year when any remainder of my attempts at studiousness flew out the window and I sailed through the remainder of the quarter on residual knowledge from high school. That probably won't happen this year. But I am definitely getting a little restless with this whole schooling business... It's getting harder each day to attend the lectures I know I'll get nothing out of or to do the reading on things I've learned, but I really am trying.

To come later: I'm going to propose some tactics to stay motivated!

My New Year

Yes, as a student, I feel as though every new year starts in late September.

I haven't posted here in a long time. Probably because I started a Wordpress not so long ago that has since gained a moderate following, so I feel almost compelled to write for that blog. I've been neglectfully abusing my Blogger account :(

But now I'm back on StudentAccount, which I feel could be a really good for me, academically speaking. If I force myself to write about my school-related doings, I'll have to accomplish a lot each day in order to come off as a good, productive student. Makes sense, yes?

This is great. I'm guilting myself into studying. That's dedication at its finest. I have class in 9 minutes, but I will be posting regularly from now on. I will.