Looking Back

A few highlights from my DC experience (stolen from Christine in Washington):

Now that I'm done with my UCDC experience (and anxiously awaiting my research seminar and elective grades), I want to reflect on my experience as a whole.

The Internship
My internship was filled with ups and downs, but I miss the State Department already and can't wait to return. Although I'm thankful to be temporarily done with the challenge of dragging myself out of bed much too early in the morning to wait for the only-on-time-when-I'm-late buses in the cold, I miss everything else about my internship. I miss all the projects I got to work on and always knowing about current events without having to hunt through a newspaper. I miss my coworkers most of all - they welcomed me with open arms and were always willing to help when I had a question. I promised I'd stay in touch, but I'm worried that I'll soon get too caught up in the winter quarter routine of schoolwork, jobs, and extracurriculars and will forget to contact them!

The last day of my internship, my coworkers threw me a goodbye party and gave me a few things to remember my experience by. As much as everyone joked around with me, saying I wasn't allowed to leave DC until spring, my coworkers all wished me the best of luck with law school applications and even offered to write me a letter of recommendation. I hope I can get back to the State Department (and maybe even the same office!) as soon as possible - the people there are talented and caring, and it was an honor working with them.

The Classes
It is an absolute relief to be done with my research seminar and elective. I enjoyed the classes and both of my professors, but it's nice not to have papers and exams looming over me anymore (although I really wish that grades would be released faster). The last week of the UCDC program was a blur of sleepless nights as I finished putting together my research paper - it ended up being 20 pages with 12 pages of sources (yes, that's 32 pages total). Ouch. I can only hope I get an A in the class! My Washington Ethics elective was not quite as intense as the research seminar, but still required a great deal of work. I had a take-home final (due last Tuesday) that was two 6-page essays and took longer than I'd expected to complete. I also had an optional 10-page extra credit paper to write (worth up to 5% of my final grade). I'm extremely grateful for that paper after only getting a B+ on the midterm, but it did not make last week very enjoyable. With all the writing for my elective class last week, I realize that the 20 pages I wrote last week alone for Washington Ethics was the exact same as the amount I wrote for my research paper. At the very least, I can now say that 10-page papers seem like a breeze after all the writing I did this past quarter!

The City
It's strange to be back in Davis, which is such a small and safe town compared to DC. While I never felt unsafe in DC, even walking to the grocery store at night or heading home from evening plays, Davis is another world entirely and I would have never dreamed of walking home alone in Washington, DC at 3:00 in the morning (as I did in Davis last Friday after the midnight showing of The Hobbit). Despite potential safety concerns of living in a big city, I really do miss DC. The pace of life is so different and I loved being surrounded by intelligent, ambitious, and well-informed people. In Davis I find so many people, especially students, who live in a bubble and don't pay much attention to what goes on beyond American borders. I've found myself explaining what the Arab Spring is to people twice in the past week, which I would have never had to do in DC.

Although California certainly has nicer weather, I am hoping to come back to DC soon and certainly plan to apply to Georgetown and George Washington for law school. It would be amazing to spend three whole years living in the nation's capital, even if I'd try to hole up in my apartment and avoid the cold from November to March.

The Program
Overall, I'm immensely grateful that I participated in the UC Washington Program. I would have missed out on interacting with ambassadors or sitting in on a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on Israeli defense if I hadn't gone. I would have missed Hurricane Sandy and not have toured Georgetown, George Washington, Penn, and UVA Law. I will always look back on my internship experience and time in DC with fond memories, and I'm counting down the days until I can return to Washington and (hopefully) the State Department.

Hurricane Sandy and Week Seven

It's been a while since my last post - you can hear more about my DC adventures here. But here are the highlights:

Hurricane Sandy
Yes, I am in the middle of a hurricane right now. It's cold, wet, and windy, to say the least... but at least I still have power! The federal government was closed so I didn't go to my internship, but I still had class since it's in the same building that all the UC students are staying in. As long as the internet doesn't go down, I think I'll be able to manage just fine.

New York/Philadelphia
I went to New York the weekend before last! It was crowded and dirty, but my friend Sarah and I had a blast. We saw Chicago on Broadway, walked around/shopped in Times Square, and visited Central Park. I'm not sure if I want to live there, but I'm still really glad to say I went (and I can now cross New York, Delaware, and New Jersey off the list of states I need to visit).

I also went to Philadelphia the Saturday before that (just days after my last blog post). Philadelphia blew me away - I didn't expect to love it so much! But the blend of historical architecture and stories with modern shops/food was absolutely perfect. I also made time to visit Penn Law, which is now on the top of my list (it's tied for the #7 law school with Berkeley and UVA). Penn is prestige with a breath of fresh air - the buildings center around a tree-lined courtyard, and the entire school is sprinkled with comfy lounges and fun artwork. As long as I break a 171/172 on the LSAT, I'm confident about my chances of getting in... and now I know I'd be very happy to go there. Also, I can get a certificate in Middle East and Islamic Studies - this is seriously the perfect school for me. Except maybe Stanford, because I wouldn't mind going to a school with beautiful weather...

The Internship
Now that I'm halfway done with my internship and am past the "settling in" stage, I really love it at the State Department. The work I'm doing is meaningful and it's a turbulent region, so I'm never bored. I also got to meet some "celebrities" last week (the Secretary of the Treasury and a few ambassadors), which just reminds me how lucky I am to have gotten my dream internship. I'm already applying for an overseas internship for next summer - hopefully I'll get some experience in the region before I go off to law school!

The downside of my internship (that isn't really a downside) is that I have to reevaluate my life plans. I'd originally wanted to work as a lawyer in an embassy, but now I know that positions like that don't really exist - you can have a law degree and join the Foreign Service, but you won't be practicing law. So eventually I'll have to make some tough decisions - do I want to join the Foreign Service? Do I want to join the Civil Service and actually practice law, but not live in the Middle East? Do I want to work as a lawyer abroad for another U.S. Government department? Still, decisions like that are at least five years away, since at the very least all of my plans involve going to law school first.

Academics
My classes are definitely keeping me busy. I had my research proposal due last week for my international policy seminar, and we've had a lot of other assignments due in that class (ranging from memos to reports on World Bank development programs). I also have a midterm coming up this Thursday for my Washington Ethics elective, which I spent a lot of time this weekend "studying" for. By studying, I mean catching up on the required reading... but hey, at least I'm getting it done now and not Wednesday night!

It's also just about time to register for my winter quarter classes. Our registration appointment times were released today and we start registering next Monday. I'll most likely be taking 24 units - sounds like fun, right? I'm hoping to continue with Arabic 22 (assuming my self-studying works and I pass the Arabic 21 final in December) and also take Microeconomics, Gender in the Arab World, History of the Modern Middle East, and Developmental Psychology. I'll also be working on my psychology honors thesis (a 2-quarter project that's worth 6 units total across the quarters), although I haven't done as much prep work as I had planned.

What I Haven't Done
1. Studied for the LSAT since coming to DC... oops.
2. Kept up with the Arabic 21 curriculum (I'm a couple of weeks behind)... again, oops.
3. Seen the monuments! I've done plenty of sightseeing, but that's something I've missed so far. I'm sad that the fall foliage will have been blown away by Hurricane Sandy by the time I get out to do that.

Before I go, a photo of me from last week:

Three Weeks In

Happy Columbus Day!  I survived week three and am enjoying a cupcake from Crumbs on my "day off" (no internship today, but I still had class). Since I updated my DC blog, I thought I'd take the time to post here as well!

I visited Charlottesville, VA the last weekend of September. I got to tour Monticello (Thomas Jefferson's estate) and the University of Virginia. Virginia is a beautiful state, although I wish it hadn't been so cloudy and cold!

Monticello:

I really liked the University of Virginia as well, except that I got the impression that it was very Southern and "old money." As a liberal Californian, I don't see myself fitting in there, so it's off my law school list for good (despite not having toured the law school itself).

Pictures from UVA:

My internship so far has been full of ups and downs. There are a lot of long days (and I'm still not taking full lunch breaks), which is getting pretty exhausting. Some days I'm extremely busy and have a lot to work on, but other days there isn't much to do. Things are always crazy in the office, but as an intern I just don't have the training to take care of all the projects and tasks that the actual State Department employees can. I'm really pressuring myself to contribute more, since it's about time that I found a long-term project to work on (and something that really helps out the office). I feel like I'm not living up to my full potential - I was hired for a reason but I haven't truly demonstrated that yet.

On a non-internship note, I spent Saturday touring the Capitol and Library of Congress. It was cold and windy, but the buildings were amazing so I managed!

The Capitol:

Library of Congress:

I spent Sunday shopping in Maryland (despite the fact that it was 50 degrees and the Metro was under construction, nearly tripling the time it took to get to the mall). There were some great Columbus Day sales so I managed to get two pairs of jeans, two shirts, and a dress for less than $70. Not quite at my Black Friday sale-levels, but I'm still happy!

Overall, it's starting to get colder here and I'm really missing California - the weather, the people and slower pace of Davis, my family/friends/boyfriend, and even taking normal classes! I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed over here, which is understandable considering I'm working full time, taking classes, and am still the VP of Public Relations for a law-related community service organization and still lab managing (over remote connection) for the Psych lab I work in. That plus attempting to learn Arabic 21 and study for the LSAT is really taking a toll on me! It certainly doesn't help that my apartment has cable and my roommates spend all their free time watching TV - I'm wasting more time than I typically do during the schoolyear, so I'm not as productive as I normally would be. I'm hoping that as the days pass, I'll get a bit more settled in and will be able to resume overachieving.

One Week Down, Ten to Go

I made it through the first week of my internship! It's been absolutely exhausting. The office is very hectic and it's been hard to learn everything - acronyms, current events, even how to get around! But things have slowly been getting better. I've gotten to attend a lot of really interesting meetings and I'm finally being given more responsibility. I can tell it's going to be a busy quarter, since I've been working 9-hour days all week with no real lunch break. Preview of what's to come if I work in a law firm, maybe?

I've had to venture way outside of my comfort zone this week. First of all, COOKING. After two years of eating food from the dining commons, I'm not enjoying cooking all my meals. I've had a couple of dinners consisting of oatmeal or a large salad, just because it's easy and I'm too tired after getting home from work. Another new thing for me was taking the Metrobus everywhere. I'm finally learning how unreliable DC public transportation can be... I ended up walking to and from work a couple of times, just because the buses took too long to come! Lastly, I've gotten to take a taxi for the first time (while going to an embassy on an internship errand). I don't spend enough time in big cities to have taken one before, so that's something I can cross off my bucket list. Not that I have a bucket list... but if I did have one, taking a taxi might have been on there. Maybe.

Other than work and all these new additions to my life (some welcome, some not), I've been busy with Global Law Brigades and the Psych lab I'm managing. I also started classes last night (with my Washington Ethics elective), so soon I'll have to get back to school-mode again. It'll be hard finding the energy to devote to everything, but I'm confident I can do it as long as I can catch up on sleep over the weekends! I can't exactly sleep until noon this weekend with all the site-seeing I have planned, but I should be able to recharge a bit regardless.

Hello from DC

Just a quick update to say that I'm finally in Washington, DC! I'll be here the next 11 weeks and I couldn't be more excited. (Of course, I'm also nervous, terrified, ecstatic, and in denial about which coast I'm on.)

Here's me at the airport at 4:30am California time...

My internship starts tomorrow morning, which isn't quite so fantastic considering I'm still jet-lagged after landing this afternoon. At least I'm almost finished unpacking and settling in!

If you want more updates on my DC experience, don't forget to check out my official DC blog for the quarter. I'm going to do my best to blog a couple of times a week, or even every day if I can manage it!

Goodbye, Summer

Happy Labor Day (and welcome, September)! Even though summer isn't over until the 22nd, to me the beginning of September means that summer is over. Considering autumn is my favorite season and I'm spending it in my favorite city in America, I'm not extremely upset about that... but I still can't believe that summer's almost gone!

What I've done this summer:

1. Worked! A lot. 40 hours per week, often more when you factor in Mondavi Center shows and the occasional tour. And lab managing takes up anywhere from 2 to 15 hours per week, depending on my duties... so overall, definitely kept me busy.

2. Read. Also a lot - my current count is 30 books read over the summer. And I'm not done yet! I'm hoping to finish at least five more before I head off to DC, leaving me with about 20 books to go for the year in order to meet my Goodreads goal of 75 books for 2012.

3. Hung out with my boyfriend. (The "a lot" is practically redundant at this point.) But hey, who else will watch Netflix with me for hours to make up for all the shows that I don't have time to watch during the academic year?

4. Studied for the LSAT. Not exactly a lot. I've completed three practice tests so far, leaving me two behind my current goal. I know I'll catch up, but the only question is when... Moving has definitely thrown off my study schedule!

5. Studied Arabic. Rather infrequently, to be honest. I've learned a few more chapters of vocab and covered a lot of grammar, but to be fair I haven't been studying it regularly and I wouldn't have put in any work if it wasn't for my friend Saliem encouraging me to meet with him weekly for tutoring.

6. Shopped! During high school summers, I always used to visit the mall frequently and spend maybe $50-$100 at a time (depending on how many hours I was working at the bookstore and on what clothes I currently needed). It was social outing for me - but not anymore. Now I'm stuck with online shopping and occasional trips to the outlets if I'm really stuck. Online shopping is definitely a new experience for me, since I'm paranoid about buying clothing if I don't know it will fit me perfectly. For some strange reason, I've had the most success with shoes (which is odd because I have a hard time finding shoes that fit right when I go to actual stores) - I'm currently wearing an amazing pair of black flats I ordered from Payless, and I have some adorable beige booties in my closet waiting for the streets of DC. My adventures with Charlotte Russe's Friday the 13th online sale for non-shoe items were not so fruitful, however, considering the sleeve of one shirt I bought came off in the wash. Oops. And as far as the outlets, I definitely took advantage of the Labor Day sales yesterday when buying a couple of suits for my internship. I bought a dark gray blazer/skirt combo from Ann Taylor and a dark navy pinstriped suit (with both pants and a skirt) from Banana Republic. Spent over $450 yesterday, but at least I have the comfort of knowing that I have amazing suits and will look oh-so-professional  throughout the last two years at Davis and my law school days.

7. Lastly, hung out with friends. My year as an RA was terrible for that. I saw my RA staff members all the time and my fraternity brothers/sisters a lot, considering how much time I spent on fraternity stuff last year. However, I rarely saw my friends from freshman year and wasn't able to keep in touch much with any of my high school friends. Even back in spring quarter freshman year (when I was rushing my pre-law fraternity), my friends in the dorms jokingly referred to me as a ghost because of how little I was around. So this summer I've been doing my best to hang out with friends - game nights, trips to the farmers market - and have been encouraging my high school friends to come visit me in Davis, considering I'm not home in the Bay Area to spend time with them. I have incredible friends and I don't want to lose touch with any of them, so I'm trying to repair the damage of my busy schedule before it's too late.

If I blogged more frequently, I could almost add that as number 8 to this list! But I think I'll cut it off there - you know all about the other things I've been up to (essentially just alternating between obsessing over applying to law school and preparing for DC!!!). And speaking of blogging more frequently... I will do my absolute best to blog every week when I head off to DC later this month. At the very least I'll be updating my DC blog, so I can link over those posts if necessary.

Hope you're enjoying the last of your summer!

Moving Day

I just moved into my new apartment today! I'll only be here for a couple of weeks until I head to DC, but I'm looking forward to spending next winter/spring/summer in my beautiful new place right by campus. I just finished unpacking (minus my desk and books, but I'll pretend I'm done) and am loving the place so far. My housemates are really nice, even if it'll be a bit strange since the girl I'm sharing a room with is also named Christine...

Work and LSAT studying have been keeping me busy; so has preparing for DC! I'm going shopping for work clothes this weekend to take advantage of the Labor Day sales, since nice blazers/skirts are crazy expensive. Still, I want people to take me seriously at my internship and while I'm networking - that won't exactly happen if I'm wearing a low-quality pantsuit from JCPenney or a Forever21 blazer.

The last thing I've been up to - reading! I finally finished the Inheritance Cycle (since I hadn't read Eragon/Eldest/Brisingr in years and wanted to re-read them before I tackled Inheritance). I've read about eight books other than those this month, including Dearly, Departed by Lia Habel (zombie steampunk), The Gathering Storm by Robin Bridges (Russian necromancers), The Selection by Kiera Cass (Esther from the Bible meets Princess Academy), and Dreamless by Josephine Angelini (modern day Greek mythology). Mostly light YA stuff, but I can save my heavy reading for the school year!

Law School Spaz Attack!

I'm currently relaxing on a couch in the ARC, enjoying the campus WiFi. My summer apartment no longer has Internet (the product of a shady housemate discontinuing it and returning our modem after she moved out for the year... without notifying those of us who still live there), so I'm glad that I live close enough to campus that I can just walk over and pick a spot to sit back, relax, and study/check my email/update Facebook/BLOG. It's a lovely 101 degrees outside right now, so free Internet and air conditioning with a Starbucks 20 feet away from me is a highlight for the day.

I've been keeping busy the past week and a half. Lots of time working, of course, but I've also been studying Arabic, working on IRB renewals for the Psych lab I'm managing, reading, and hanging out with friends (a couple of my high school friends came up to Davis yesterday, which was nice). And of course I'm studying for the LSAT too! After spending the first month and a half of my summer intending to study for the LSAT yet barely even cracking open a prep book - despite having two checked out from the local library - I finally buckled down and set up a study plan for myself. I'll be doing one practice test per week up until I take the test in February, except for doing a test every other week while I'm in D.C. unless I find myself with more time on my hands. In theory I'll also be doing practice sections during the week and honing Logical Reasoning, which is currently my worst section. My first full-length practice test of the year (taken last Saturday, the first day of my new study routine) was a 169... a full 7 points higher than my first practice test back in spring of my freshman year. Considering this is only the second full practice test I've done, I am ecstatic about this and am confident that I can break a 174 in February... provided I stick with my study schedule, of course! I wouldn't say no to a perfect 180, but realistically I'll be in the mid-170s. Still 99th percentile, and definitely good enough to get me into a top law school (maybe even HYS)!

As you can see, law school is definitely on the mind right now. A lot of my free time at work is spent stalking the websites of T-14 law schools and poring over their viewbooks. I've plugged potential scores into Law School Predictor at least a dozen times this summer, if not in August alone. At this rate, I'm pretty much determined to plan my way into a top law school. Being an obsessive planner has never led me wrong so far and I doubt it will now! I spend so much time talking about the LSAT and law school that I think half of my Facebook friends are probably convinced that I'm graduating a year early and applying for law school this fall. What can I say? I'm just excited for the future and determined to be on top of applications!

Don't You Love Bureaucracy?

Happy August! Only a month and a half before I leave for D.C. and I'm practically counting down the days. I have a separate D.C. blog set up (Christine in Washington) to talk about my experiences there, although of course I'll still be updating D&A.

Some good news - my double major paperwork finally went through and I am officially declared International Relations and Psychology! My Facebook friends might know that I originally filed for my double major back in mid-June, but the dean's office lost my paperwork so I had to re-file last week. I just got the approved form in the mail and I am good to go!

Some amusing and slightly bad news - the dean's office also mailed me a degree check and is trying to tell me that my upper division writing requirement wasn't fulfilled. I took Legal Writing back in winter, which fulfilled the requirement, but supposedly I hadn't completed 84 units at the time (a condition for taking the class) and the dean's office is telling me the class no longer counts towards the writing requirement. They forgot to factor in my 20 units of AP credit, which put me at 94 units (while they think I had 74). FAIL. At least it should be an easy fix, assuming I can get an appointment with the dean's office anytime soon - unlikely, since they prioritize students with real problems instead of students who aren't graduating for two more years that fell victim to clerical errors. As they should.

On another note, I've been doing a lot of law school research lately. Pretty much any school in the top 20 is on my radar, if not on my potential application list. I'll take some law school tours when I'm on the East Coast for the fall - made easier by the fact that I'm spending Thanksgiving break with my cousins in New England - although technically I won't narrow my list down until I take the LSAT in February and know which schools I should be targeting. I have an idea of what my GPA will be like after next year and it's pretty heartening, especially since any A+ I get counts as a 4.33 for law school so all the A-minuses I've been getting aren't hurting me as badly as they could.

It's strange to think I'll be applying in law school in just a little over a year from now. I've practically been preparing since high school, but it just seems so soon. I know everything will work out in the end, though!

A Midsummer Morning's Ramblings

I thought I'd take the time to blog since A) it's been far too long and B) I still have 30 minutes left of work before I can finally go home and crash. Got to love on-call shifts...

The past few months have been insane yet fun! Spring quarter was a blur of classes (which went well, if not as well as I'd hoped), boyfriend, fraternity events (I was VERY busy as our social chair and Relay for Life team captain), UCDC preparations, and of course the RA job/Mondavi Center/tours.

Highlights:

• Fraternity banquet in June that I spent the quarter planning (pictures up on Facebook!)
• Working the Improvised Shakespeare Company's four-night run at Mondavi back in April
• I was accepted to my dream internship - I'll be working with the State Department in fall!
• My summer job with Conference Housing - it definitely keeps me busy and the hours aren't always great, but I love having a full-time job and I can't complain about a customer service/desk position
• Getting "Tour Guide of the Month" for June
• Being promoted to Lab Manager for the Social Psych lab I've been working in for the past year
• Midnight movie premieres for Avengers in May and Dark Knight Rises last week <3

More than anything, I'm excited for Washington, D.C. right now. I still can't believe I landed my dream internship (and I just passed my background check a couple of weeks back, so I'm good to go). I'm actually setting up another blog for D.C. since UC Davis wants to give prospective students a taste of what UCDC life is like. Hopefully that means you'll be hearing from me more in the fall!

Quick Hello - It's Finally Summer!

This is just a quick update - I know that it's been FOREVER but my quarter was absolutely insane. Now that I'm on summer break I'll actually be able to blog again! Even though my "break" consists of working 40 hours a week with Conference Housing plus tours and the occasional Mondavi show, along with studying for the LSAT, reading about 50 books, and hanging out with my boyfriend. So, pretty normal summer for me!

Hope everyone's been having a great summer so far! I'll update you later this week on how my crazy spring quarter went and maybe post pictures of my new place! (I've finally moved out of the residence halls - goodbye, RA position!)

Happy April!

Ignore the fact that today is April Fools' Day - I promise that nothing in this post is designed to trick you. Pinkie swear.

Spring quarter starts tomorrow! I'm excited for my new classes and for my fraternity's spring rush, but I'm not quite ready to be back to getting four/five hours of sleep a night. I'm also going to be doing Zumba classes this quarter to get back into shape, since I gained a bit of weight this year and I don't like it. My mom said she'd help pay for the class and I just bought some yoga pants, so now I have more motivation to go!

The Good News
I got into the UC Washington Program for fall quarter! I found out on Tuesday morning (maybe 11 hours after my last post), which was definitely the highlight of an otherwise heartbreaking spring break. I'll be going with a few friends from my fraternity and quite possibly more people I know, although I won't get to find out who all the other participants are until our meeting on Friday. So, this essentially means I'll be in Washington, D.C. for the presidential election, and I'll have an internship that people would kill for (or at least I hope). Can't wait!

The Bad News
My U.S. Foreign Policy class didn't work out the way I thought it would, and now I have to go beg my TA for more points to bump me up from a B+ to an A-. I doubt it will work, but it's worth a try. My GPA dropped by .01 this quarter, which is tiny but still embarrassing since it already dropped .03 last quarter. It'll be harder to get my grades up to something that will help me get into a T-14 school... thank goodness that I test well, since my LSAT score should save me from my very-good-yet-not-Yale-material GPA.

Just for fun - here are a few books I've read over spring break:
1. Overbite by Meg Cabot (3/5 stars) - Semi-trashy vampire novel, a fun and light read
2. Starcrossed by Josephine Angelini (4/5 stars) - Greek mythology in modern times!!!! Need I say more?
3. The Overachievers: The Secret Lives of Driven Kids by Alexandra Robbins (5/5 stars) - This essentially sums up ME in my junior/senior year of high school.

March Blues

Well, I'm finally on spring break. It hasn't gotten off to the greatest start. My grandma passed away Sunday night at the age of 84. My family knew it was coming, since her health has been declining lately, but I thought it wouldn't be for a few more years. I'm really going to miss her - I'm just glad that I was able to be home to see her in the hospital (even if she was in a coma) before she passed.

So much is up in the air right now. I'm waiting to find out the date of the funeral (and whether I'll have to miss classes/cancel any tours/switch around RA on-call shifts), since it probably won't be until after Easter. I'm waiting to hear back from the UC Washington Program, waiting to find out my final grades for winter (which probably won't be as nice as I'd been hoping), waiting to find out whether I'll be employed with Conference Housing for summer, waiting to hear about another position in my fraternity I applied for...

I'm just emotionally exhausted right now. I'm semi-excited for spring, but it's hard right now. I'm not ready for Gram to be gone and I'm not ready to deal with school again.

Finals Week Fun

Just a quick update since yes, it's finals week. I can't believe winter quarter is almost over! In hindsight, maybe 22 units plus my jobs/extracurriculars/boyfriend wasn't the brightest idea. But oh well, too late now. I'll only be taking 18 units in spring (Arabic, Social Welfare, U.S. History: 1917-1945, Abnormal Psychology, and a seminar for my honors program), so that'll be nice... even though I'll be giving more tours, doing more Mondavi shows, and maybe even doing a leadership position in my fraternity. Also, I somehow found myself agreeing to be a tutor for Research Methods in Psychology, which would give me 3 units of academic credit and bring me back up to 21 units... oops.

I'll do a longer update later when I don't have to study for my four remaining finals. The worst part of 22 units? Five finals over the next few days. One down, four to go.

Happy Presidents' Day Weekend!

I hope everyone's been enjoying the 3-day weekend! It's been relaxing yet productive for me - after getting only three hours of sleep on Thursday night (in the midst of a large application, PHI 12 problem set, and catching up on Arabic homework), I had a tour and a Mondavi show and then rewarded myself with eight hours of sleep Friday evening. Another tour Saturday morning, but then I went out to lunch with a friend to celebrate being done with the application for the position we're applying for in our pre-law fraternity.

I headed over to a friend of a friend's apartment to check out her place - I might be rooming with her next year. I obviously won't be a resident advisor for next year, what with being in D.C. for fall quarter, so I need a place to live next year (preferrably somewhere that's close to campus but cheap enough that I can still afford to pay rent for the quarter that I'm gone). Most of my friends have their housing for next year worked out already - the curse of my freshmen year friends living together after the 1st year - so I've been stressing about that a lot lately, but luckily a friend told me about a girl from her church group that was looking for a third roommate to live in an apartment complex right next to school - a complex that happened to be my first choice due to its low price for the location! So I went by yesterday to meet her and tour her apartment. She was really nice (her name is also Christine, which will be awkward yet hilarious) and the apartment was amazing. I'll be meeting her housemates next week and will hopefully be all good to go after that! So relieved to be almost done with housing.

I also managed to vacuum and semi-dust my room yesterday, as well as take care of laundry and my sheets. Having a clean room always makes me happy... plus it's a great way to procrastinate on working on a 10-page paper for my Theories of International Relations class (I have to turn in a rough draft by Thursday and all I have so far is a vague outline). I'll be taking care of that today and tomorrow, in between going out to see The Woman in Black and to Sacramento to try out a new vegetarian restaurant with the guy I'm dating.

The weather's been getting nicer over the past few weeks - spring is here! It's supposed to be 74 on Wednesday, which will be wonderful since I've really missed warm weather. The trees in the courtyard outside my window are starting to bloom - I might post pictures in a couple weeks. I love springtime in California.

Happy Mid-February! (What happened to winter quarter?)

Quick update before I get back to working on applications! This quarter has been absolutely insane so far.

Academics: Yes, I'm still taking 22 units (Arabic, Recent U.S. Foreign Policy, Theories of International Politics, Symbolic Logic, Legal Writing, and an into-to-research seminar). I had my two POL midterms yesterday. Studying was brutal, especially since I had to catch up on all the reading I hadn't had time to do over the quarter. At least they're over, and one of them went well at least... Now it's time to start on my two 10-page papers. Sigh.

Work: I'm still working as a resident advisor, doing 1-2 shows per week at the Mondavi Center, and giving 2 or 3 tours per week. Way too busy, but at least I'm making a lot of money! Plus I'm still really enjoying all three jobs. And who knows, maybe Tour Guide of the Month will be in my future!

Extracurriculars: I'm still really involved in my pre-law fraternity - I'm currently our Relay for Life team captain and am applying for a leadership position for spring. Fingers crossed for that! I'm still helping out as a research assistant in a Social Psychology lab, and am still part of the Academic Affairs Commission of the student government and we're working on personal projects right now. I'm working on a way to create a mentoring system for freshmen on academic probation, so we'll see if anything comes from that! And then I'm also the Vice President of Public Relations for Global Law Brigades, which goes to Panama for a week to offer legal advice to underprivileged families on land titling. I can't actually brigade with everyone this year, but I'm using all my connections to make sure we can get the word out about recruitment, fundraising, etc. and I'll be all set to brigade next year.

So overall, you can see that I've just gotten crazier as college has gone on. I don't know what it is about me, but for some reason I feel the reason to add to my load each quarter! If I don't have a breakdown, it must mean it's time to add on another activity for the following quarter... that's my motto, apparently! Oh well, at least I'm relatively happy. I'm applying for summer jobs that will let me stay in Davis, working on my app for the UC Washington Program for fall quarter, and trying (in vain) to figure out housing for next year. Stressed, but that's normal for me.

Calm Before the Storm

Winter quarter starts tomorrow. It's kind of a scary thought, although exciting too. 22 units, the RA position, tours, Mondavi shows, assisting in a social psych lab, and then my pre-law fraternity. Everyone keeps looking at me like I'm crazy when they hear everything I have going on! But I know the quarter is going to be a blast, provided I can hold onto my sanity. Thank goodness for coffee!

At the very least, it feels great to be back in Davis. I really enjoyed being home this year (although for only two and a half weeks), getting to spend time with my family and friends. But I finally feel like I'm back where I'm supposed to be: on-campus and busy. I kind of like testing myself - adding a little more to my plate every quarter and trying to see where my limits are. So far, I haven't found them. I'll pretend that's a good thing!

Hello, 2012!

Happy New Year, everyone! As amazing as 2011 was, I am ridiculously excited for 2012. So many plans for this year - leadership position in my fraternity, orientation leader job in the summer, and spending fall in Washington, D.C. - and some goals as well - straight As every quarter, be able to speak conversational Arabic, tone my abs, and read 75+ books for the Goodreads 2012 Reading Challenge (since I missed my 2011 challenge goal by one book). Also, I turn 20 in March!


But since I love reminiscing, some highlights of 2011:

• Joining Phi Alpha Delta (and getting to know my big in spring and little this fall)
• Becoming a tour guide and resident advisor
• Getting involved in Social Psych research
• My last time directing day camp
• Amazing new friends!
• Book and movie releases (Deathly Hallows Part 2, X-Men: First Class, Mastiff, Naamah's Blessing, etc.)

I have three more days until I'm back to Davis. Winter quarter starts a week from tomorrow and I can't wait for all my new classes! It'll be the best quarter yet... I hope.