I'd Rather Be Sleeping

It's Monday and I'm not going to pretend to like it.

I hope you all had an awesome weekend! I had so much fun with my family this weekend, but I won't have time to write about it until tomorrow or Wednesday. #sadpanda

Yes, I actually sent this Snap out last night.

After enjoying myself all weekend, I got home to a messy room(why do I do this to myself?) and a 4-6 page paper that I hadn't started writing yet(still working on it). These guys were pretty decent writing buddies, but I could not concentrate no matter what task I was working on.

I guess it's time to get off Twitter and get back to my actual schoolwork. To the dual monitors, Batman!

Any tips for getting stuff done when you can't concentrate?

See ya when I see ya!
XO - Monny

Can You Hear Me Now?

Good morning afternoon!

Today's Blogtember Prompt is Describe a distinct moment when your life took a turn.

Since I was a senior in high school, I wanted to be a Speech-Language Pathologist. I wanted to work with stroke and accident victims, administering speech therapy and teaching them how to talk again so they could regain some normalcy in their lives. I decided that I didn't want to work with kids because they were so young and they didn't know what they were missing out on, whereas adults were used to talking their entire lives just to have their voices taken away from them. I wanted to give a voice to those who didn't have one.

When you're an undergrad for Speech Path, you don't only learn about speech stuff.  There are two branches of Communication Sciences --speech and hearing. You need a graduate degree to get a job in either field so I always knew there was even more education ahead. I never wanted anything to do with hearing science (audiology). I thought, "the ear is gross and boring. I wanna help people talk." And I thought this for years. Three years.

Fall semester of last year, I had a really difficult class. It was writing intensive and I could. not. deal. I was working 25-30 hours a week, plus coming home and doing schoolwork after being out of the house for 16 hours. I dropped my availability to just weekends and I still couldn't catch up on my homework. I had a nervous breakdown and after having too many panic attacks in one week, I talked to my parents and then my adviser for advice. I dropped the class that was giving me such a hard time and I felt like a failure. How would I ever survive graduate school when I couldn't handle one stupid undergrad class? I looked at application requirements for graduate programs for speech and seeing the 3.8-4.0 average GPAs of the acceptees, I freaked out.

Then there was a moment of clarity...

I decided to Google audiology and I fell in love.  I wanted to know everything about it -- the anatomy of the ear, hearing aids, sound waves, cochlear implant videos on Youtube. I looked up schools with Audiology programs and found that they were less competitive than the speech ones. The degree is a four-year clinical doctorate(scary!), but I finally found my calling in life.

I'm graduating in January so I'll be attending grad school next Fall. This semester is going to be rough between work, classes, taking the GREs(yikes!), asking for recommendation letters, and applying to the 10 schools I have on my list.

So this is the most long-winded post I've ever written. Here's a baby hearing his parents' voices for the first time. Love it.

Funny how one freak-out can change your whole life.

XO - Monny

Who Am I?

I decided at the last minute to join the Blogtember challenge with Jenni at Story of My Life. I think with school starting, it'll be a great idea to have my post topic picked out in advance.

So on with today's topic, the post is about where I come from. I'm gonna be a little different and avoid talking about my family or hometown. I'm gonna talk about how I attended Catholic schools from Kindergarten to 8th grade.

Yes, plaid skirts and knee socks we're my uniform for 9 years. Sexy. I had such a different experience growing up in a Catholic school than all of my public school friends. When I started 9th grade at my public high school, it was complete culture shock.

first Communion  //  confirmation pic with the bishop  //  dressed as St. Monica  // first day of school (circa 1997)

Catholic school has made me the person I am today.

I always write in cursive. Being graded on penmanship and only being allowed to write in cursive for the majority of my academic career means I will probably never break the habit. When I started high school, my friends were baffled that I would write in cursive even though I didn't have to anymore. Honestly, it's easier to write this way. I don't have to pick up the pen for every. single. letter. It's also awesome to write my notes in cursive because it means no one will every want to borrow them. Apparently it's hard for people to read? I dunno.

Sample of my lovely cursive

I respect authority figures. When I started high school, it blew my mind that kids would talk back to the teacher or give a principal attitude. It still kinda blows my mind, actually. I see it at work too. I have no idea how people think it's okay to backtalk their manager or supervisor. When passing professors in the hallway, my automatic response is to say good morning or good afternoon, so and so. When I was in grade school, we'd stand up and chant good afternoon, [insert name here] whenever another teacher, principal, priest, or other special visitor entered the classroom. Respect.

I have pretty decent grammatical skills. I'm not saying I don't make a mistake every now and then, but I'm fantastic at proofreading. I actually enjoy it (I should've been a book editor). The first time I proofread one of Kris's term papers, I laughed out loud. When I asked him if he'd ever heard of run-on sentences, his response was "they don't care about that stuff in public schools!" It took every ounce of my self-control to not strangle him. In third grade I knew what a preposition was, how it was used, and was able to recite them in alphabetical order. In 10th grade, my teacher made me explain prepositions to the class because they'd never learned about them before. WHAT?

I have Faith. It is an experience like no other, that I got to learn about the history of what I believe in for 9 years. It's hard to explain, but there is a pride in knowing you went to a school with people who believe in all the same values as you do. Without Catholic school I'd never have caught the liturgical music bug that keeps me close to my faith through my "job" as a church singer today.

I hope this post shows a little more of what makes me me.

XO - Monny

Surviving Syllabus Week

Happy Friday, Blogland!!! I've never been happier to see a Friday, even though I have to head to work at 4 o'clock. The first week of school is almost over. And my sanity remained intact (for the most part). Tonight, I'm gonna get drunk go home from work and get my shit together for Tuesday so I can make the most of the long weekend.

Since I'm in my 19th year of school, I think it's safe to say that I'm an expert and getting the first week of school overwith. So I thought I'd put together a little how-to on making through the first week of classes, otherwise known as syllabus week. Read this, and then go grab a drink because the weekend is here and it's time to celebrate!

Step One: Books
Before you even think about buying your books from the school store, check out the plethora of rental and buyback sites to see if you can get it cheaper anywhere else. My friend Megan at Yammering Yankee wrote an awesome post about CampusBookRentals.com. I legit saved myself $280 by renting this semester, and I don't have to worry about burning the textbooks when I'm done with them (kidding...kinda). Your school bookstore is going to charge you the absolute highest price because they know that college kids are lazy and don't want to do the footwork to find the cheapest price. RENT RENT RENT!

Step Two: Syllabi
If your professor posts the syllabus on Blackboard or whatever site before the class starts, print it! It makes it easier to follow along on the first day and it makes you look like less of an asshat because you don't have to raise your hand to say you don't have one. Also, you don't have to spend the entire first day of class by frantically scribbling notes about office hours and assignments. It's all in front of you.

Step Three: Be early
During the first week of classes, get to your classroom as early as possible. Make sure you get the seat you want and put up your flag to claim your territory.  No one wants to be stuck in the corner behind the tallest kid in the room, or in the dreaded front row. My chosen seat is usually in the second row (so I can Tweet unnoticed) in the left-handed desk (lefties ftw). God help the person who decides to take my seat after the first week of classes YOU WILL PAY.

Step Four: Make friends
If you're lucky like me, you've already scoped out which of your friends are in your classes so that when a professor says "find a partner" on the first day, you can happily avoid the creepy mouth-breather next to you. If you're not so lucky, start a conversation with someone who looks kinda decent before the professor even gets there.
  
Step Five: Caffeine!
We all know that when school starts, your sleeping schedule is going to make you hate your life be a hot mess. 5 days in and mine is not back to normal yet. I've been going to bed between 10 and 11 pm and my body still wants to stay up til 2 am. NOT COOL. I found out the hard way that it really, really doesn’t like waking up at 5 in the morning. To beat the morning and afternoon sleepiness, make sure you find the nearest Starbucks, Saxby's, or Seattle's Best and introduce yourself to espresso drinks. Or if you're cheap like me, you can be bff's with your travel mug and Keurig and save a shitton of moolah to use at the bar.

If all else fails, Google tropical beaches and cocktail recipes or take a nap. Sometimes it’s easier to pretend that it’s summer. Have a good semester and try to keep your cool. 14 weeks until finals!

Linking up with Whitney for the first time. It's Friday so #backthatazzup ! Gatsby came out on DVD this week so it's only fitting to use one of Jay-Z's new masterpieces.

XO - Monny

Where is the Wifi?!

Guess what! I survived the first day back to school. I love love love my American Sign Language class and the fact that my friend Kim and I get to be partners for every task. I learned how to ask someone for their name and to tell them mine. And shapes and stuff. The entire class was taught in ASL so it was very quiet. I didn't realize how difficult it would be for me to keep my mouth shut the whole time. Thank God for a 15 minute break in the middle. I needed to exercise my mouth haha. I'm so not used to not talking. Like hello?

Here's a little preview of me having no clue what I'm doing practicing.

I should probably work on my facial expressions since I look like a zombie.

Also, since I can't live-tweet my Statistics class due to NO INTERWEBZ in the basement, I wrote down all my thoughts yesterday.

• Why are most non-traditional students so weird?
• WHERE IS THE WIFI?
• If this asshat behind me doesn't stop kicking my seat, I'm gonna curbstomp his face.
• Look at those ratchet nails on the chick next to me.
• "Humans are bad at math."
• People still use the Cornell method?
• "Zeus could tell you the parameters, but we don't know for sure."

I know you're sad that I couldn't tweet all that.

Hope you're enjoying the last couple weeks of Summer!

XO - Monny

P.S.- Happy 15th anniversary of the release of  HP and the Sorcerer's Stone!

I Should Be Studying

 

Hi Bloggers! Tonight is a special night because it's Friday. It's the end of the week -  people are out drinking and dancing, relaxing with friends and blowing off some steam. I do not get to be one of those people. I don't get to be young and carefree and do YOLO-y type things because I'm taking a Summer class. (cue scary music) I have a Biology exam on Monday worth a whopping 22% of my grade! (DUN DUN DUNNNNNN) I should be reading over my powerpoints about meiosis and cell reproduction, but I'm not feelin' it. What better way is there to procrastinate than to stalk Miley's and Amanda's Twitter accounts?

Anyway, I hope y'all are out having a great time! Only 18 days left of this torture until I can actually get drunk have some fun, but who's counting?

XO - Monnny

A Not-so-bad Day

When I set my alarm last night, my phone said I had 4 hours and 1 minute to sleep. I was fed up, worn out, and run down from the ridiculous language intervention analysis project that I had been working in all week for today's due date. If you'd been assigned this project, you would be pulling you hair out too.

if  I never see another transcript summary again, it'll be too soon

Let's skip ahead to this morning. I checked my weather app and gritted my teeth at the rainy forecast, then grabbed my umbrella. When I got to the train station, the last thing I expected to see was this:

sunrise over the tracks

 I have to admit, it's really hard to hate the morning when you're greeted with a sunrise like this one.

My day got even better when 2 of my 3 professors let class out early, resulting in a spontaneous lunch date with Kim at Qdoba. YESSSS! 

At some point between lunch and 3pm, I lost my Owlcard, which wouldn't have been such a big deal if it didn't allow me to access all the academic buildings, my Diamond Dollars, and printing allocation. After freaking out for a good 10 minutes and retracing my steps, I discovered that some wonderful person found and turned my card into the desk at the computer lab. YES.

Dear awesome ID picker-upper, if you ever read this, I want thank you and hug you and tell you that I love you. Unless you're creepy, in which case I'll shake your hand, thank you kindly and walk away.

A mini coffee date with Kristo was the perfect way to end the day that I thought would be a bust.

Take-away message? Don't expect that a day will end badly if it starts out badly.

XO - Monnny