3 Weeks to Go!

As I warned previously, my posting has slowed as a result of my hectic study life. I am at no shortage of things to discuss, and I hope to get you caught up, or at least fill in some more of the gaps once school wraps up in 3 weeks for the semester.

In short, here are the latest happenings:
I spent last weekend in NY visiting my girlfriend. NY is awesome, definitely not a bad place to show up every other month! She had only been in her new apartment a day when I arrived, but already had the city mapped out and was able to show me around without missing a beat. It is amazing how quickly she can adapt to new surroundings. We did Brooklyn Bridge, the WTC site, Little Italy, China Town, Greenwich Village, a Broadway show (Avenue Q), and checked out a few of the local restaurants. It was a packed weekend!

School is consuming my life. When I'm not working, I'm studying. I have a test tomorrow, a big paper due in 2 weeks that I started today, and 2 finals the week of Nov 14. Needless to say, I'm busy. I feel like I've all but abandoned my friends to keep up in my classes, I have had to skip out of Halloween parties, dinners, and various get togethers at friend's places. The plan for next semester is to take it down to one course so I'm not driving myself into the ground. I'm no good to anyone, be that work, school, or friends if I'm burned out. Balance is key to success. Once I get back into the groove of school I'll bump it back up to 2 courses.

School Update - So Far, So Good... But Not Without Effort

Classes are going. I'm putting in a lot of study time again, I hope it pays off. I had 2 tests this week but was unsure as to how they went. School is starting to wear me down a little. I have been fighting a cold for the past week and trying to work ahead so I have a little buffer room. It probably isn't necessary, but I hate being behind the ball on school work.

I'm not feeling pessimistic or down about school, I'm just ready to be done with the semester. I'm 5 weeks in, only 5 weeks to go. I can do it!!! Go me!

Long Live The Party

This past weekend my girlfriend flew in and was in town through Wednesday while she was dealing with getting the right stuff moved from storage to her apartment in NY. It was great to see her two weekends in a row, I'm getting spoiled, the past couple of weeks it hasn't felt like she is 1200 miles away at all.

We hosted a party (as mentioned in the last paragraph here) on Saturday, kind of a meshing of friend groups, both hers and mine. We had a pool tournament, video games on the wall, and cards going. The same friend who last year brought road kill rabbit to grill this year brought a keg. The downside was that it was only 1/3 full. Oh, and it was bottled back in June. And did I mention he found it baking in the hot sun at the bottom of a ditch, where it had been for at least 2 months? Yes, that was some scary brew. Luckily, I'm not much of a drinker so it was no real loss.

It was cool to meet some new people, and just to have people over for once. I hate hosting so I rarely have friends over. It isn't that I don't like having people over, it is just the whole planning, prep, and cleaning part of it all. If I could afford to hire someone to plan parties for me I'd be hosting every weekend.

I had a friend come up from Mankato just for the party, I was blown away by that. Although we keep in contact, we rarely see each other. I doubt he knew how much it meant to have him show up, and I'm too macho of a guy to ever tell him.

Every year it is tradition for me to give away cheesy door prizes, and this year was no exception. Candy cane lights, a PC controller from 1995, CD-ROM based board games, and a stuffed animal. With prizes that strong, how could you not show up?