Greetings from Swatland. I am, in fact, alive. Although it's been close.

Finals are pretty killer. Four papers, and one exam for me. Luckily, I'm pretty proud of how disciplined I've been and I don't think I'll be too pressed for time. So no stress, but a lot of mental fatigue.

I have actually done some fun stuff this past week, though. I went to the winter jazz performance students played in- so cool. I don't know what good jazz is, but it sounded pretty to me. I also went to the a cappella concert featuring all of our a cappella groups. I hadn't been to one yet, and it was obviously mind-boggling. I was expecting some holiday songs, and was a little disappointed but it was bomb nonetheless. And then two days ago I went to a mini theatre performance. Different students did about 5 different scenes from different plays. It was a good variety, and made me think some more about acting. I think I want to take a theatre class here, maybe next year.

It's been raining all day today. Doesn't it know it's supposed to snow, not rain? I think the weather is having a bit of an identity crisis. Hah. Stupid joke.

Speaking of identity crisis...my roommate is forcing us to go Christmas caroling sometime next week. Only she's Jewish. Haha. It makes me laugh. She also wants to write her first letter to Santa. It actually looks kind of terrible...like the conquering Christians are at it again. Only it's really not. It's all her. But I guess she's going to teach me a thing or two about Hanukkah so I'm excited for that.

3 essays down, 1 and some studying to go.

Hope you all are enjoying your snow. or lack there of.

Loveeeeee.

Hola.

It's mee. In the library. Reallly not wanting to start on my finals. And thinking about you guys.

I had a sweet day today. Only one class, then met a girl on the soccer team I haven't seen in awhile for lunch. After lunch Alex and I played some tennis... we hit around for bit, did some serving and then played a few matches. He's in a tennis class for PE here and took our outing a little more serious then I was expecting. It was fun though, we got pretty competitive, but in the end he pretty much swept me. Although we are like the exact same skill level. It was just his day I guess. After tennis we swam at the indoor pool on campus and it was awesome. Just breaking the mold of the everyday routine. But in effect I didn't get much work done so now I'm paying for it.

I also went to work for an hour today. I got a job at the cage, if I haven't mentioned already. Pretty laid back... you just fold all the athletes laundry for however long you want to and talk (or listen) to the older guy that works full time in there while he watches you fold. Today I probably listened for 20 minutes about a scandal with the track uniforms. I honestly couldn't even tell you what he said. I have no idea.

Oh yeah, it was 60 degrees today. In December. It's nutsss. Nuts. But supposedly people are saying it's supposed to snow this weekend. So we'll see.

Lovve you guys.

Jeeeeesh. It's been a while. It's the first day back from break!And it sucks. It was so great to be home but that amount of time wasn't enough to miss school and more than enough to make me want to stay with family. Ugh. And these next three weeks are going to be intense. The definition of intense. But in a way I'm kind of excited to be likened to one of those olden day torturing machines that stretches your arms and legs in different directions until... i guess I don't actually know what the end result is. Well, in my case, hopefully a lot of cerebral stretching.

Haha that made no sense at all.

Anyway, Thanksgiving was a blast. Travel was pretty smooth for the most part and I got rides to and from the airport, making life so much easier. Jeff, Lynne, Trey, Payton, Grandma, John and Sandy came over for a big family affair, complete with way too much food, watching football, throwing the football, and playing cards. Wish we could have been with the Browns and Nonna and Papa too, but it sounded like they had a great day in tropical Arizona. I finally got to see my second Husker game of the season but there's no doubt where I'll be for the Big XII championship. That's right, monopolizing the dorm's TV surrounded by pushy Lost addicts. Right when I got back to Swat it was back to the old routine. Stayed up till 3:30 am writing a paper, went to class, and gave my first presentation of my college career.

I said "ethnograful." Instead of "ethnographical." Hahahah. Whatever. It went allright.

But I'm going to lunch with my roomie and a friend so I promise I won't be such a slacker at this anymore.

Byeee.

Yelloo strangers. Dang I miss you guys.

Just finished up class for the day and am thinking of seriously throwing down on some work. For those of you shamefully not following Swat Women's soccer, we lost in the first round of the conference tournament. It was pretty disappointing just because we had so much potential. The game unfortunately ended in a shootout going scoreless in overtime. A couple minutes before regulation time one of my teammates hit the crossbar on a shot but it evened out their crossbar shot earlier in the game. It's whatever though. I'm already pumped for next season and am curious to know what the off season is going to be like. Not having the seniors there next year is really going to suck, though. Really fun group of girls. Pretty awesome season.

I'm not sure I can really report on anything outside of doing work and soccer... I took a little trip to the Goodwill and I got a cooking pan, a sweater, snow boots and an old Polaroid camera. So that was very exciting. When I was checking out my treasures a man behind me saw my film camera and we started talking and he said he has a few lenses he wants to get rid of that would work for my camera and some interesting film he likes to mess around with. We have one big event on campus every semester which is usually bringing in a pretty big band and that's going on Saturday. Girltalk is the band coming, whom I don't know much of but kids here are really fired up about it so I'm really looking forward to it. From my understanding it's a dj-esk guy who mixes different music together, a really popular style right now. Yeah, it'll be fun. Aaaaand because we don't have a soccer game this weekend I get to see the Husker game! Hecckk yeah. Iz also wants to go to this apparently amazing house this guy made entirely out of cement and they give tours and stuff? I don't really get it but it'll probably be another one of her elaborate schemes she drags me off to. So it's guaranteed to be good.

Still flying under the radar of the swine, although more people are getting it everyday. Let's see if I can keep it that way. Hope everyone else is staying healthy. Lovee.

Sorry I'm such a failure at this...I've been busy? Ahh that's no excuse.

As far as soccer goes, we had a really big couple of conference wins and then lost a doozy. That put us in a scary position for the conference tournment, but after some other loses by teams we officially have a bid. I'm so excited because I know we can beat every team in our conference. If we play well. That's a big IF.

School has been pretty nuts lately... 4 am, 6 am, 4 am nights. So i turned in two papers and then did absolutely no work yesterday because I could. Today it's back to the old routine, though. The leaves here are amazing by the way. Just glanced out my window and it's pretty freakin incredible. Fall in an arboretum? Can't get much better. Everyday there are more students here infected with the swine flu. There are a couple in the basement of my dorm and one on my hall, that I know of. It's freaking me out. If you are confirmed to have it you get quarenteened in a room in the health center. No way am I doing that so keep your fingers crossed for me. 

A couple nights ago I went to the opening night midnight showing of the Michael Jackson "This is it" movie. It was pretty incredible- the background dancer's saying what it meant to work with him, all of the rehearsal footage, seeing the artist in his element doing what he has made such an impact on. It was awesome. Now in the next couple days I'll be finishing up work and getting my Halloween costume together. The seniors have decided we are going to be S.W.A.T. team officers, like the cute play on words because our school is called Swat. The idea is a lot better than the costume is going to look. A couple freshman and I walked to Target yesterday and bought black gloves and hats and t-shirts while we ran into a few girls from our school not on the team who had legitimate S.W.A.T. gear in their Toys-R-Us bags. So basically we're going to be shown up hardcore. But whatever. I'm going to see if I can make one of those bullet belts and maybe a few other accessories. We'll see.

Off to the dining hall and then borrowing a bike to go on a little ride with a friend.

Love and miss you guys.

Jeez it's hard getting back into the study mode. Luckily I can afford to have a sluggish start because I don't have much work to do.

A couple weeks ago one of my hall mates, Mariam, and I made a list of things we want to do this year. One of them is to get on top of every roof of every building on campus. So she came to my room last night dressed in black and Emily and I got into similar apparel and went out into the night around 11. We passed the dining hall first and giddly attempted to boost each other up but the gutter was too flimsy and we were giggling too much. We downsized with a roof I've been on before of one of the dorms. It was easy because you can climb out of this one window right onto the roof. However we had to endure some embarrassment as there were a bunch of kids sitting in the lounge. We debated for awhile whether or not to do and finally without a word just opened the window and walked right out, being as inconspicuous as possible. The black outfits didn't help with that, however. The next one was trickier. We found a staircase in the main building in campus that led to another and eventually to metal stairs on the side of the building, and there was number 2. Number 3 was the Science Center which we conquered easily. After that we called it a night. We want to knock out a few more before it starts getting cold.

Haha and also tonight I was leaving the dining hall and I saw my roommate some distance over at the chocolate milk with her back to me. I was eating an orange and about to climb up the staircase when I decided it'd be fun to hit her with a slice of orange. Surprisingly I nailed her in the back of the head and as she turned her head to look for the culprit...it definitely was not my roommate. I casually proceeded up the stairs. Ahh. Good times.

We have a big game tomorrow that I really want to win and I'm off to practice.

Love.

Hello and goodbye Becca. It was a short visit but we loved every minute of it. I tried to get her to write a blog but she wouldn't. Typical.

Sooo. NYC. After we got in and stayed that first night with Jess at her Uncle's in The Brox we slept in and were off to Gisa's house. Freakin public transportation. We got on the bus, got on the subway and then got lost. And it was freeeezing. Not snowing but pretty dang cold. Gloves and hat and coat cold. But of course we had fun nonetheless. Jess and her friend Jane were with us and while we were lost Jane taught us the moonwalk. I'm actually pretty good and Becca's getting there. I already showed it off in the dining hall the first day we got back to Swat. So we finally just grabbed a taxi to get to Gisa's little brownstone- thanks dad- and then she wasn't home. After a little moonwalk practice Gisa came home. She had gone to the bus stop to wait for us :/ It worked out though. 

Gisa is one of the most incredible people I think I've ever met. She ushered us into the basement apartment of her little house, showing us everything- "This is my boiler room." "This is my closet" "This is my bathroom. I have toothbrushes. Do you need a toothbrush?" Gisa, her husband Benek, Becca and I sat through a lunch of bread and cheese for a good couple hours talking. Benek has dementia and it made me pretty sad but he would laugh when we'd laugh so that was happier. But Gisa makes sure she talks enough for both of them. Stories started pouring out with philosophies and theories and conclusions. It was too good not too get out the video camera. A little inappropriate for the dinner table, I thought, but too good to not tape. She doesn't seem to mind, though. For the rest of the day and the next morning we listened to story after story and saw pictures and letters from an unimaginable past. We did run out of tape but there's got to be some good stuff in what we have. We spent a lot of the time at the dinner table eating cucumber and cheese and meatballs and for breakfast, lat and bagels. I can't bring myself to think of that meal now but Becca really liked it. It was all in all an amazing experience. Once in a lifetime.

We said our goodbyes and spent our last day roaming around Manhatten, doing really nothing to mention. We took at least 5 different subways all over the city, thank goodness Jess knew what she was doing. We finished the day off with pizza and hot chocolate in Brooklyn. Jess's uncle dropped us off at 5 and we found a cute breakfast diner downtown to burn time before our bus came. My friend drove Becca and I to the airport to drop her off this afternoon. It was unbelievably good to have her here. I miss her already.

Love ya'll.

In Neww Yorrrk. We made it!

Becca took a cab from the airport to swat and after a little walkie talkie-ing we found each other. I threw clothes in a bag and my roommate Emily picked us up to take us to where the bus was picking us up. Traffic was insane and I think it took around an hour to get there so we had to grab a quick dinner and boarded the bus. Everything went so smoothly that I was suspicious. The bus ride took around 2 hours and when we pulled onto 34th street, New York City my friend from Swat and her friend were there to pick us up. We walked a ways to grab the subway and then got on a bus to walk a few blocks to my friend, Jess's, aunt and uncle's  house. I was a total noob on the bus and got barked at by the driver because I was putting my coins in one at a time. All I can say is I'm learning. Jess's uncle made us rice and soup when we got there and Becca and I went over some of the questions we want to ask Gisa. Gisa is a Holocaust survivor my dad met at a conference who Becca's connected with and decided to make a documentary about, tying her story to similarities in Darfur. I don't think we really know exactly where we're going with it but I'm pretty excited.

Everyone's still sleeping now...I got up and showered and am trying to get a little work done before we take the subway to Gisa's and Becca and I spend the night there. It's going to be awesome. Love you guys.

Feeling a little under the weather today. Woke up with a heck of a tummy ache, fever and stuffy nose. But we had a game so I dragged myself out of bed to the co-op and onto the bus. The field we played on was so crappy and it was pretty rainy the whole game. We came out on top, though, 2-0 but it should've been way worse. Enough of the depressing shtuff.

Last night I went with a couple people into Philly and it was so nice to get off campus. We took the train out to Center City and walked more then I thought possible. But it was so sweeet, I felt like I was in a different country. The streets were narrow and full of people living; eating, yelling at each other, walking. It was so cool. We came across a chocolate restaurant called something like Chocolate by the Bald Man or something and it was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. Chocolate pizza, waffles, milkshakes, cake, shots. I shared a chocolate peanut butter banana pizza with a girl on the soccer team and it was a work of art.

Being done with midterms is sooo nice. Although I'm definitely still recovering from them. But that's not to say I get a break from work for awhile...I have a few books to read plus some other readings and a paper to edit. It never ends. 

I can't wait for Becca to come. It's seriously going to be awesome. We're taking a bus out to NYC and hopefully my friend who lives in the Bronx will meet us there and we'll stay with her a day and our interviewee a day. Don't know exactly what to expect on either accounts but that's the best way to go. Complete spontneity. AKA the Ross sisters. I love it.

Loveyouguys.

Midterms are allllmost over. I'm sitting in the library avoiding editing my final paper that's due tomorrow. Gah I can't wait for fall break.

Because I've had a more relaxed week then most other students (bc my hell week was last week) I've gotten to relax a little more which is nice. Two nights ago a couple girls on my hall stopped by my room and asked if I wanted to go to this sushi-making event and then tango. I accepted and we walked to this little makeshift tent in the middle of the lawn on campus. It looked a little sketchy but we went in and the tent had definitely reached capacity long before we got there. The guys there were all wearing yarmulkes and upon inquisition I figured out the sushi-making was sponsored by the Jewish group on campus. Odd combination I thought. People were gathered around a small table rolling their chosen type of sushi, avocado and celery for me! They passed around a tray of cookies and we echoed a Hebrew blessing on the cookie. Sort of a twilight zonal experience but pretty fun.

One of the girls and I proceeded on to tango and we were a little lost because of all the classes we've missed. We were learning really hard stuff like close embrace and the lean your body's supposed to have while dancing. Pretty tough stuff when one imperfect step screws everything up.

Okay I gotta revise this paper. Love!

Mm I love late night studying. It's daa best.

My past couple days have been crazzzy. So i had those two papers due Friday, right? That put me at a bed time of 7:30 am to sleep for an hour before class. And then it didn't even feel liberating to turn them in. Probably because I know I have to revise them in a few days. Friday night was awesome...there's an old building called Old Club that hosts dances and concerts. It's really cool lookin with a windy staircase, balcony, and dusty chandeliers. But anyway, there was a line up of student musicians, everything from an acoustic guitar rap group to an electric guitar/cello combo. I was really impressed with what I heard but I guess I should've expected there to be some musical talent here.

Saturday we played our game in Maryland and won in a nail biter. They shouldn't have had a chance against us but I guess we like to give the crowd their money's worth. I spent all day today doing work and I'm pretty much spent. I Sunday night skyped with the fam tonight which I loved. All of us right there on the Family Bed. haha. Aaaand it looks like I'll be able to watch the Husker game Thursday! I'm going to e-mail the person in charge to reserve the TV for that time period and I don't even care if I'm hogging the tube. I have yet to watch TV here and after all it's 1/80 mine. (I have no idea if 80 people live in my dorm.)

Becca and I have no idea what the heck we're going to do in NYC over my fall break but I couldn't be more excited about it. It's gonna rockkk. The plan is to take a bus from Philly to New York and then stay with my friend from school who lives there and she's going to help us get where we need to be. Wherever that is. Ahh I'm excited.

Love you all and miss you allll.

Hiii there.

Well I just woke up and took a shower and have a little time before my 9:55 class.

I've been busier then the word gives me credit for. Mel, Nonna and Dad left yesterday :/ but it was soo good seeing them. It just so happened that the weekend they were here is going to be my heaviest workload until finals, but it was actually perfect timing because without them I would've been so stressed, probably taking no breaks from work. Plus it was just great to see familiar faces. From what they told me they had a great time, dad said he thinks they saw every tourist attraction in philadelphia (and nonna disagreeing). But they did do alot- they saw the Liberty Bell, Constitution Hall, a couple winerys, the Phil Museum of Art, me, of course, and had cheese steaks. I was bummed I couldn't spend more time with them, especially because I'm just as unfamiliar with the city as they were. They got to see two of my games where we went 1-1 with a loss to Johns Hopkins. I unexpectedly started the second game they saw so that was kind of a nice surprise. We got a few games of Manipulation/Shanghi(Gin) in and I gave them a pretty pathetic tour of campus. Overall I'm so thankful they came, nothin' like family.

I hope the rest of you are doing well and I wish everyone could come and visit me!

I've got to get dressed though and then finish two papers today so wish me luck.

Loveee.

Hey guyss.

So I've officially started my first paper. I finally realized I had been doing research and planning and everything else imaginable in order to put off the actually writing. But that is no more because I have about two paragraphs written. I'm fairly excited about getting it under way. I walked to the anthropology building to get started on the paper and sat down and just wasn't feeling the writing environment there so I walked to the library and searched for a good spot on the 2nd floor to get down to buisness and then that just had a bad aura too. So I walked back home and that's what I've gotten accomplished. 

We had an away game tonight against Widener and mann they were diirty players. And they weren't even good but we absolutely couldn't score. So it went into overtime and then we scored in the first 2 minutes. So unnecessary. 

I'm pretty sure dad and mel and nonna get here tomorrow! Haha pretty sure as in I know that I should know this and I'm almost positive. It sucks because all of a sudden I have 4 papers due next week and a test. It's really not fair but I can't wait to see them all the same. They're going to watch our game against Johns Hopkins and I'm getting really nervous. We'll see.

Before our game I went to a speaker on Middle Eastern reality television. The dude was a pretty big hot shot in the world of academia as far as I could tell and it was really interesting. I had a bit of a hard time focusing because I had to watch the time to run to the bus for the game. The speaker was recommended by my Cultures of the Middle East professor who just complemented me on my class participation. :] That was exciting. I'm diggin that class but Global Warming on the other hand....is absolutely rediculous. I was under the impression it was an easer science class. I guess easier is a relative term.

Love you guys.

Not much to report for today, but the equipment manager (that's not really the right term, but for lack of a better one) Ray e-mailed me some pictures he took of me playing and I think some of them are worth showing. Such a nice guy. There to say "Have fun" when my parents can't be. I love the guy.

Monday's just suck with 3 classes and I hardly got any work done and had practice from 8-10 pm. Merrrr. After practice when I was doing work in my room the fire alarm started going off in our building. My instinct was to grab my computer, my keys and a pencil (?) and slam my door behind me. Turns out to be a reallllly burnt bag of popcorn. Embar on whoever's part.

Love and miss you guys.

The weekend's gone and it feels like it never came. I've been doing a lot of work in anticipation of the papers I have coming my way. I feel things really starting to pick up.

And I haven't been in the best health lately. Nothing like the swine flu or anything, knock on wood, but I had zero energy during my game yesterday and felt like I was about to pass out on the field. Today I've been feeling pretty weak too and hot flashes. I don't know what's going on but it needs to cut it out.

We played a reallly ugly soccer game but got the job done with 1-0 win. We better start picking it up or the Johns Hopkins game next weekend will be an embarrassment. The guys played Hopkins yesterday and I really dislike them already. And I guess the girls team is just crazy.

Big weekend in the Neb world... Homecoming for Bec and Z and then the close Husker game. At half time of the soccer games sometimes they announce football scores and one of the equipment managers said he was going to make a shout out to me with the score of the Nebraska game but I think he was joking because it never happened. Or maybe I just wasn't conscious at that point. Hah. Just kidding. Can't wait to see the pictures from homecoming.

I just screened a film from 1920 for Cultures of the Middle East and it was pretty interesting. A documentary with no words only music about nomadic tribes in the Middle East. In 20 minutes there's a tutor for that class meeting with any students who want to but I don't know what she'll be tutoring us about. I'm going to check it out and bail if it's pointless. 

Got some mail today from Non. Lovee it. Love youu.

Talk to ya'll later.

Depressing weatherrr. On the one hand it makes me want to burrow myself in the library with some coffee and just work for hours but on just as easily I could get back into my pjs, put the blinds down and sleep the afternoon away. I wish the second could prevail.

The goal for today is to go grocery shopping at the dinning hall. Meaning I bring empty bottles and tupperware to lunch and discretely fill them with milk, cereal, fruit, etc. I'm not sure how legal this is, I'm sure it's at least frowned upon, but our room is in dire need of some goodies and I figure they deserve it since the dining hall closes at 7:30. What do they expect?

I got another package todayyy :] I kid you not it's like Christmas when I get those. Pulling out trinket after trinket from my cardboard stocking. And Santa was so good to me...a harmonica! I am so. pumped. I was messing around with it in my room and I'm sure my roommate is just as excited as I am. haha.

Last night we had our first loss to 6th or 7th ranked College of New Jersey. It definitely sucked but they were so freaking fast and we didn't completely bow down. There was some fight in us. It's really frusterating, though, because I know I can be playing better and I know our team can play better. Hopefully we can bounce back from this.

Love.

Hello, hello. I'm laying in bed after my 9:55 class allowing myself a little down time because I figure the next 7 hours will be spent in a wooden chair in the library. I have my first research paper due October 1 for Cultures of the Middle East :/ It's gorgeous out today though so I might try and get some work done outside.

My roommate's tennis match the other day was pretty awesome. It's been awhile since I've actually been to a match and she completely dominated. I also owed it to her because I think she's been to every one of my games. But isn't that the role of the roommate? I also watched the guys soccer team beat the #2 team in the country, cause for serious recognition of their odds of making it to the national championship. That would be siiiiick. And even sicker if we could do the same. 

I don't think I can make it to tango tonight because we have late practice :[ it really sucks. It's really starting to get on my nerves how much I'm missing out on because of soccer. Hopefully I'll be able to be involved in more after season. 

I wish I had something exciting to report but I got nothin. Just thinking of you all and getting so excited to see dad, Nonna and Mel in a week or so. Ahh that's going to be awesome. 

Love&miss you guyss.

I've been reading Technology in World Civilizations for a couple hours and decided this is a worthy excuse for a break. The gorgeous weather was short lived as it's freeezing here now. Well, not freezing but pretty dang chilly and rainy. Last night we had late practice from 8pm-10pm and it was raining on us the whole time. I woke up this morning to the same kind of weather but dragged myself out of bed for some waffles at Sharples. Delicious. I've been avoiding Sharples lately because my stomach knots up after every meal of applesauce, cereal, something vegetarian and chocolate milk. I wonder why... Breakfast is always pretty safe though.

We won our away game 2-1 after playing the first half like complete poop. We have a game tonight against a pretty tough team and I'm told that's how the next couple are going to be. Nerve-wracking. 

I'm going to my roommate's first tennis match in about 20 minutes so that will be interesting, probably get some more work done and then go to our game. Tonight there's a Michael Jackson party so I'm pumped for that but am lacking the proper attire I would've liked. I'll be missing seeing the Big Red play today :[ but go Huskers all the same.

Love.

I have a new love: tango.

Ahh my roommate and I dragged two boys from our hall to free tango class last night and it was so freaking fun. Hardly anyone at the lesson had danced the tango before so I was right where I needed to be. After the hour lesson whoever wants to can stay after for an extended lesson. There's where we learned the really cool stuff and I got to dance with someone who's been doing it for a year so that was awesome. It's such a beautiful dance and I reallllly hope I can keep going to the lessons. I'm now deeming Tuesdays Tango Tuesday.

Moving onto other exciting news I got my first package in the mail today, a decent sized box of love from the homestead. The guy at the post office was kind of a jerk but it made my day! I made the Easy Mac for lunch in my dorm along with some of the other goodies. So thanks so much guys, I really loved it. Although I'm going to have to say the first mail I did receive was from Nonna and Papa and that was just as exciting. The things you guys do for me :]

But I'm leaving to go to the field house to leave for our first away game. And rankings came out and we're 23rd in the nation! So that's pretty dang exciting. Just an exciting day overall.

Love you guys.

I hatee titles. And I'm sick of sounding like a cheese ball in these. Therefor, no more titles.

We won both of our games this weekend 6-1 and 2-0. Coach told me today that somehow I made it in pictures on the front page and on the story of a local county newspaper. Haha it made me laugh and Coach gave me the newspaper.

Today kind of sucked because I had 3 classes, one of them lasting 3 hours, and then a meeting with Coach. Walking home from my meeting, a teammate texted me asking if I was sick of the cafeteria food and if I wanted to make pancakes instead for dinner. I said yes and met up with her. It became quite the excursion as we ended up taking the Septa train to her farmhouse (about a 10 minute train ride) to get away from campus for a couple hours. The farmhouse was incredible. It's been in her family for over 200 years and every room is full of giant bookcases filled with ancient books, old appliances like a sewing machine and the coolest typewriter I've ever seen. The bath tub, too, is as old as the house. I could spend hours there with my camera, and plan on it. Iz, my teammate, cooked us banana and chocolate chip pancakes from scratch. She's just crazy. The bus fair was $8 roundtrip which is too bad because I'd love to go there more often.

So at 11:30 I sat down to do work. Thankfully I only have one class tomorrow. It's almost 2 as I write this and the goal is to get up at 7:30 to go for a run in the Crum woods. I'm ashamed I haven't explored the woods yet and early in the morning is really all the time I have to do so. However, the goal for everyday this past week and a half was to get up a little earlier and go to breakfast, which has yet to happen.

Hope you all are well.

Slackin off.

Wow I just realized it's been a few days since I've wrote. The days go by so fast when you have to go to class, do work, class, more work, soccer and more work and sleep. And repeat.

Class has been grrreat, I love all of them. And haven't overslept any either. I dropped my art history class, disappointing, I know, but picked up that global warming class. The art history class just wasn't my thing and the only class I was counting the time down till it was over. So I made the necessary changes.

But I have never read more in my life. And I'm not sure that's an exaggeration. Thankfully the stuff is pretty interesting and cool but can be pretty thick and hard to get through. My strategy is changing up my surroundings. I bounce along from laying on the grass to my bed to the library to a bench to the lounge, in various body positionings. Just thinking about writing my first paper makes me sweat. But I have a week or so until the perspiration actually begins.

We won our first game 2-1 but it wasn't a pretty one. I'm learning that we're a little slow to start and it cost us a goal in about the first ten minutes. Our first goal was scored by one of our players sortof pushing a girl and the ball into the goal and our second one came late in the second half off of a cross. Pretty sick. About 20 minutes into the game another freshman and I made the first substitution and played the rest of the game. Being out there under the lights again felt so good and I can't wait for this weekend. It's the SwatKick Classic Tournament that we host so NYU, Bishop Bible and a couple other teams come down to play on our field. Luckily the weather's been so nice lately, around upper 70s and at night in the 60s. Ideal soccer weather. 

After practice today a few of my teammates and I walked up to the little town and got free sushi at the Co-op. I guess it's a new thing they're having there or something, I don't know, I just ate some sushi. There's a comedy sketch I'm hoping to go to tonight if I get some work done and then rumor has it that tomorrow is a marraige-themed party. I guess because so many Swatties marry other Swatties...or something. Kindof sketchy, I know.

A picture of my roommate and I as requested. She's a goof and things are still going well with that.

Miss you guys.

Great First Impressions

The first dayy. went well.

I had Global Warming which is a class I'm just looking at to replace one of my others and that was pretty awesome. It would give me much more of an understanding of what's happening to our planet, while fulfilling a science requirement :]

Then I ran directly to Cultures of the Middle East and I'm in love with the teacher of that class. She's middle eastern, I'm not sure from where yet, and is so cute and at the end of the year has the class over to her house for a middle eastern dinner. I got 2 chapters of reading to do for tomorrow and I already knocked that out but it wasn't easy. I'm starting to understand how much reading I'm actually going to have. And it's a lot. A lot, a lot.

I hung outside on a bench until my next class, the first year seminar Technology and Humanity. That was probably my favorite because we didn't do typical first day stuff but actually got into discussion. We had to write down 3 of the most important techonologies in our lives and the most important one of the future. We shared those and had crazy discussions about the list and anything to do with the list. It's a small class of 13 freshman, though, so since we have a class we don't feel intimidated in everyone kind of lays it all out. Which can be good. Or can be a lot of freshman talking at once. 200 pages of reading in that class due in a week. = death.

I know my dad will go through some painful face expressions while reading this but whatever. This morning my roommates alarm went off early so I had to get up and slam that off and then someone was mowing the grass outside my window so I had to tune that out and you know the story can't get much better. I don't even remember silencing my alarm on my phone and woke up when my roommate was opening the door at 9:56 and my class started at 9:55. I didn't know what would be more disrespectful, showing up late or not at all. But then I realized I don't even know where the building is so I just didn't go. I e-mailed the professor asking to meet with him today to apologize and get anything I missed. So, yeah. Amazing.

We have our first real game tonight against Alvernia and then there's salsa dancing lessons tonight so if I'm up for that after I'd really love that. We'll see.

Love you and miss you.

Back to school, Back to school...

So we lost the scrimmage. The final score was 2-0.

BUT we had a penalty kick that we missed, and our goalie got injured in the first half and we don't have a back-up. So seeing as that presumably is the best team we'll play, I'm pretty excited. Before the game I felt like peeing my pants but I made a decision that it wasn't going to get the best of me. Watching the first 15 minutes from the bench didn't help either but once I got in it was just another game. Pretty fun stuff and it felt so good to finally put all of our practices to use.

The activities fair was today meaning all of the clubs were spread out on the campus' lawn. The frisbee team was chucking it around, there was a flute player, a kind of martial arts involving drums, boxes of free CDs from the campus radio station, and a lot of coercing. I signed up for entirely too many and I know I won't have nearly the amount of time I wish I had, but still. There are so many cool things to do... ie salsa dancing lessons, the student-run garden, meditation group, progressive Christians, volunteer projects, Sundan radio project, literary magazines, improv comedy (the most persistent of coercers). Needless to say I wish I could do it all :/

Tonight was the traditional showing of The Graduate on the campus lawn the day before class starts. Not the best movie I've ever seen but it was fun to spread out blankets and be initiated in this unique way. 

And, yeah, I said it. Class starts tomorrow. It's so weird...another monumental first-day-of-school complete with a sleepless night, I'm sure. Only mom won't be there to take a picture of me awkwardly holding my backpack in my carefully selected outfit. And me getting pissed about it. I kind of wish she were.

Wish me luck...I'm scared witless.

Love.

Is this actually happening?

Last night my SAM (student academic advisor) and I were up until 2 am trying to figure my schedule of classes out. I had looked through the entire course list and made a list of 30 classes I really thought sounded good, which he made fun of me for, and had to pick 4 of those that also didn't conflict with the others. It was quite the puzzle. We ended up jimmy-ing the registration a bit and miraculously I got lotteried into every single class I put. It's hard to explain but basically, it's amazing. 

So my schedule (for now) and their descriptions are as follows:

Art History- Modern Art: This course surveys European and American art from the late 18th century to the present. It introduces significant artists and art movements in their social, political, and theoretical contexts. Attention will also be given to interpretive strategies that have been used to write the history of this art. Issues to be considered include definitions of modernism and modernity, constructions of gender, the rise of urbanism and leisure, the independent art market, and questions of originality and representation.

First Year Seminar- Technology and Humanity: It sometimes seems as if science and technology tend to replace communal understanding and human relationships. Historical and social scientific investigations suggest this is an illusion however; technology has always been shaped by and embedded in personal connections, group struggles, and cultural understandings. The real danger in fact lies in letting false impressions of technological dominance create unnecessary inequality and oppression. The class will explore this topic using examples such as the development of modern industry, the construction of railroads, the risks of nuclear catastrophe, the digital divide, and the development of online identities.

First Year Seminar- Narcissus and the History of Reflection: We've all used the term "narcissist," perhaps to accuse ourselves as much as others. Narcissism seems at once reprehensible and an unavoidable part of personhood. This course investigates how, for centuries, the story of Narcissus has been reworked to understand creative reflection and how we see ourselves in relation to others. At stake are questions of desire, gender, racial identities, and language. Authors include Ovid, Milton, Wilde, Freud, and Fanon; also visual art and film.

Cultures of the Middle East: Looking at ethnographic texts, films, and literature from different parts of the region, this class examines the complexity and richness of culture and life in the Middle East. The topics we will cover include orientalism, colonization, gender, ethnicity, tribalism, nationalism, migration, nomadism, and religious beliefs. We will also analyze the local, national, and global forces that are reshaping daily practices and cultural identities in various Middle Eastern countries.

But I'm trying to switch one out for a science class so I e-mailed a professor and we'll see what happens.

Today was a good day. I met a few really cool people at dinner and I think I really needed that. In the dining hall many of the trays have different drawings or quotes written in marker on them by students and I collaborated on one for my first tray art. Just a goofy drawing.

Tomorrow we have our rescheduled game against top dog Messiah. It shall be very interesting as far as how the team plays, the caliber of d3 teams in general, my playing time, and so on. Hopefully it doesn't get rained out again. My roommate's not here right now but pictures to come.

Love.

p.s. I can't believe I'm starting classes. My advisor, a professor, told a group of us not to be hesitant to use the psychological services the school provides. Needless to say. I'm scared.

But excited.

Class of 2013

Yesterday was crassszzyy. 

After I passed the swim test with flying colors all of the freshman gathered for a speech by the Dean. He spouted off random facts about our class: the largest in number since 2001, includes the U14 world ping-pong champion (not Asian, to my surprise), Beijing olympic qualifier, someone who discovered a sunken ship, a 16-year old, etc., 56% public schooled, and other things. The group seemed pretty fired up and it was pretty exciting. We then met with our CA (campus advisor) groups and got to know each other. In my group really nice tennis player from Boston, a sail boater-er from Cali (mom-there's my sailing mentor, although he wasn't the friendliest), the cutest girl from Columbia, and a few others. Remembering names is killing me. I had no idea this was a major fault of mine. It's bad. Our CA's taught us a lot of important information: "swooping"- when upperclassmen try to date the freshman during the first week, it's frowned upon; transportation options; etc.  After our evening practice we met with everybody on our floor and discussed rules and such. Pretty boring stuff, but a Dana Bug was doing it's thing near me so that kept me entertained. (Dana Bug: A bug who occupies the Dana dorms, characterized by it's many legs and sporadic speed). After the meeting we had a social with another dorm, and I met a few more people but felt I'd kind of maxed out on the meet 'n greet for the day. There were authentic Philly foods like water ice, soft pretzels, and Tastee Cakes. Ironically all really awkward foods to eat while you're trying to play it cool at a party. 

My roommate and I kept missing each other during the day but finally met up at the floor meeting. She's from Philly and is going to play tennis at Swat and contributed a fridge and a nice carpet to our lovely abode. She seems really cool and we had some fun laughing at the awkwardness of the social last night. We've already worked out that I'm responsible for any mouse run-ins and she deals with bugs. So I think we're going to get along great. 

I forgot if I mentioned my attempt at vegetarianism. I know, I know, I'm sure bets are already being made to how long I last but I'm giving it a shot. One of the freshman on the team is a vegetarian and I was telling her how I admire Becca for it and how I've wanted to try it and that was it. We shook on it and she's been providing moral support. Yesterday there were two boxed lunch options and I was pumped to snag a chicken salad sandwich only to slide it back on the table a few seconds later and taking the alternative option of a brussel sprout burrito. It wasn't bad actually. 

Last night I opened up the course information they gave us and had a minor panic attack. All these crazy classes you can take, and what requirements you need to fill, and what the heckkk am I interested in. I have a feeing the first semester pass/fail is going to save my life. I meet with my advisor Friday to set up my classes so I have some time. I'll let you know when I know what I'm thinking about taking.

Con Amor.

Takin it Easszzy

Day off! Ahh it was so nice not to have practice today. Instead, we went to Ocean City, New Jersey with the team for a day at the beach. I bought a delicious blueberry and whipped cream waffle on the boardwalk for lunch and a water ice. Everybody's crazy about water ice here...it's like a more compact gourmet icee with tons of different flavors. I took full advantage of the day off by playing the beach bum role to the best of my abilities. On the down side my entire backside is burnt as sin. I'm so over sunburns. :/

Tonight's team bonding activity was an interesting one. For the past couple days we've had the challenge of getting the whole team to read a 130 page book and pull a quote or scene that reminds us of a story in our lives. It was pretty cool to learn something new about my teammates this way and it took over 2 hours.

I'm pretty stoked for tomorrow. The freshman are all moving in for the start of freshman orientation so for the next few days there'll be different themed parties, tours to be had, and classes to be picked. I'm kind of starting to freak out about choosing classes and my major. All along I've been really laid back about not really knowing what I want to major in, but panic is edging its way in. On top of that though tomorrow we have our 2 soccer practices and the freshman are taking the swim test. The swim test is something everyone has to pass before they graduation from Swat. You have to swim 4 laps without touching the bottom and tread water for a certain amount of time. I'm going to find the story behind that.

Love.

Rainy Days

Yesterday and today it's been thunder storming on and off all day. It looks beautiful from my dorm window with all the trees but not so good for playing soccer games. Our game scheduled against pre-season ranked #1 Messiah for tonight got cancelled but will hopefully be rescheduled for Saturday. So instead of a game tonight we'll be practicing and after that the team's getting together in a dorm kitchen and baking cookies. I haven't had a cookie in forever so I'm pumped.

We had an early walk-thru this morning and then all went to lunch. I'm told the food will get better because not many people are on campus right now so they're giving us the worst of what they've got. But for now I usually make myself a pb and j, an apple and try some unidentified option which usually turns out to be decent. I just got back from a team meeting where we learned we're supposed to be consuming around  4,300 calories a day during preseason. Definitely not happening. But I'll try and make it up with cookies tonight :]

Here are a few pics of my dorm...you've got the view of the Crum from my window, my bed and desk, and my closet. It's not the Ritz but it's homey. :]

Miss ya'll.

The Beginning

Hello helloo.

So. Just in case you don't have enough going on in your own lives and you find yourself one day thinking, "I wonder whatever happened to that Alexa girl", I'm setting up this blog. Trust me, I would love to chat on the phone with all of you every day but I'm quickly finding the college life doesn't really allow for much of that. And given my previous history with e-mail I doubt that would work out much better. So in an attempt to be wherever you are whenever you are, I present to you The Swat Life. Haha. Oh gosh. 

But basically I miss all of you like crazy after only 3 days and this is my way of staying in your lives while, hopefully, you can respond in comments telling me about the happenings of your life. Is it a real relationship when facial expressions are indicated by punctuation marks and battery power and internet access dictate communication? Mm no, probably not. But I'd like to think sometimes you can hear my voice.

Anywayss. It has been 3 days. And I'm exhausted. I've never been constantly around other people so much in my entire life. Example: After soggy goodbyes with my dad, ma, z and bec I stood in the middle of my dorm room sobbing until a knock on my door 2 minutes later from 5 of the soccer girls, there to say hello. From that point on I sleep alone and that's about it. We were given a schedule of the next week and a half and every day has a strict itinerary from 7 am to 11 pm, to the hour. We've been practicing twice a day for around 2 hours and spend an hour in the classroom and team meetings, bondings and meals the rest of the day. I was so relieved to get the fitness test over, though. I ended up 4th in the 2 mile (time unknown, unimpressive and never to be released to the public), did 42 push-ups before literally collapsing (not even top 10) and got 1st in sit-ups with 93 in 2 minutes. It's good to have it over because I was really freaking out about it. Embarrassingly so.

The team is awesome. It gets hard for me to keep putting forth the effort to get to know all 27 people (yeah, 27) without wishing to God I could be around people that I don't have to explain what my favorite concert was or who's in my family. People that were there and people that are them. I mean, of course it's fun and I love it but it can be a lot of work. Yeah yeah yeah enough complaining though. So there's 9 freshman and we all get along- last night we all got together in a dorm and ordered pizza and played Apples to Apples. I'm getting to be really good friends particularly with 2 of the freshman, one from Virginia and the other from Seattle. The upperclassmen are a different story because they already have each other but they're all still super nice and definitely reach out to us. Coach is big with that. Togetherness and such. Our theme this year is "One."

I'm playing pretty well and the freshman are definitely reppin'. We took all top four spots in the 2-mile and quite a few of us can duke it out with the older girls. I think my dad would say my body language doesn't look like I'm having much fun out there, though. I just get in a zone where I want to just play and compete and there's not much smiling involved. Wait, that's not true. I talk during breaks and stuff I'm just not all goofy like I was in high school soccer. That could be a good thing though. I just need to make that FUN song from Spongebob a mantra of mine...

Tonight for team building we drove to New Jersey to see a minor league baseball game. Before we got to campus we were told we were going to a Phillies game, but yeah. Definitely not. It was still pretty fun though. They set it up so the freshman had to go out on the field during the 7th inning stretch and sing "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" for the crowd. Hmm it was lovely.

As far as school. Oh yes, school. That's why I'm going to college. New student orientation starts Tuesday so that's when the rest of the new kids move in (right now on campus it's only the women's soccer team and volleyball team so it's really really quiet). Then we set up our schedules and all that jazz. So not much to talk about there.

Wow. I'm embarrassed about how long this is. But I did have a lot of catching up to do and I promise the rest won't even compare. I miss everybody so much and I have had only one major episode of homesickness yesterday. It just really hit me hard and I felt like I could cry at any given moment but later in the day we had a freshman meeting scheduled with Coach and it made me feel a lot better. However, I still miss you. Hope everyone's well and it's not as humid there as it is here. Sheesh.

Love.