Day Four Hundred Twenty

As promised, a belated picture post! 

First up - a photo from the Jon McLaughlin concert I went to at the beginning of this month. I finally downloaded photos from it! This is Amanda, Kelly, and I with the opening act - Jon Paulson. He was great, I bought his CD, and I'm excited to see what he comes out with in the future.

Next up - remember that giant storm I told you about? Well, here's what our pool looked like at the beginning of the storm (a few minutes after I took this photo, you could barely see the trees across the pool it was raining so hard). PS - isn't our balcony view awesome?

Aaaaaand, here's what it looked like the next morning. As a scientist, I found it interesting. As a human being, I found it gross. It's back to normal now (or that's what the leasing office tells me)...until the next major storm hits.

As you all know, I've been spending most of my free time these past couple months studying for quals (and unfortunately, I still am...only a week and a half more!). Here's a sneak peek at what me and all the other analytical second years have been going through. This is a smattering of some of the equations memorized for the first set of exams. Does it give you a headache? Me too.

To end on a happier note, getting up obscenely early to beat traffic and get to an 8am class (this is not the happy part) means I get to see some pretty incredible sunrises (happy). A few days ago I was sitting still on the highway, looked to my right, and was greeted with this view. It's times like this I'm thankful I have a camera phone. Good morning, downtown Austin.

Now, back to studying.

Day Four Hundred Nineteen

Guess what I did today?! Studied. Then napped. Then studied some more. I promise to be more exciting once qualifying exams are over. Promise! I did get an awesome sunrise photo this morning though when I was stopped in morning traffic. I would post it, but I'm typing this on my phone and am not overly motivated to get out of bed to use my computer to post a photo. So...get ready for a catch-up photo blog tomorrow! Yay Friday!

Day Four Hundred Eighteen

The first half of my qualifying exams was this past Monday, and it was four hours of stress and tough questions. And we all get to do it all again in 12 days. So...that's really all that needs to be said about that for right now. Tomorrow begins the next phase of intense studying to prepare for 3 more tests on 3 new subjects.

A few interesting things have happened since the last blog post, such as a giant thunder and lightning storm that was happening off and on for 3 days. Our apartment complex happened to be in the line of fire for all of the strongest storm cells, and we got 8 inches of rain in 2 days (5.5 inches of which happened over the course of about 6 hours). It was madness. And....it turned our pool green! I'll post a photo of it tomorrow, because it is a sight to see. I just stood at my window and stared at it for a few minutes to make sure my exhausted brain wasn't playing tricks on me. Turns out, lots of lightning and just the right pH can trigger a pool algal bloom over night. Needless to say, the pool was closed for about a week. It just reopened yesterday, but I think I'll give it a week or two to really let that chlorine do its job before going in. I showed a photo of it to basically everyone I knew at UT, and one guy looked at me and said "did you get a sample?!" He was completely serious. Welcome to grad school, everyone.

I also had my first laser hair removal session yesterday (thank you Groupon and Elements Laser Spa). We don't need to go into the details of that, but part of the paperwork I filled out was this quasi-genetic thing to figure out your skin type, asking for hair color, skin color, tendency to burn, and.....eye color. Normally this isn't too big of a deal, but each eye color had a different score attached to it. Um, what? I had to start averaging numbers and going, "well, the majority is this color, but there's also that color, so does that score become a 2, 3, or 4?" It was way more difficult then it should have been. I'm sure the lady behind the counter was looking at me thinking, "this girl is in grad school? She doesn't even know what color her eyes are." Heterochromia can be a tricky little thing.

I apologize for the extended hiatus that preceded this post. If you ask me what I was doing the past 8 days, the answer will undoubtedly be either studying, napping, or eating. My upcoming 12 days will likely look remarkably similar, but I promise there will be more frequent posting. Goodnight!

Day Four Hundred Nine

One week until quals blog hiatus.

Day Four Hundred Five

I started going to the gym again this past Wednesday. You guys...the elliptical is exhausting. I had big plans to start going every day, but yesterday I was still so tired from my Wednesday workout that I took a nap instead. So...every other day it is! Baby steps.

Yesterday I treated the blueberry to a car wash. It is so shiny right now. The car wash attendant asked if my eyes were real or contacts (haven't heard that one in a while - though I'm still fairly positive that they don't make half and half contact lenses) then complimented me on how pretty my eyes were. In a nice way, not a creepy way. It's been a while since someone has commented on my funky eye color, it's nice to know some people still think they're cool.

In today's odd occurrence, I found a guy's rent check on the UT shuttle ride into campus. In a very roundabout process involving calling his parents (whose number was on the check), then getting a phone call from him, then getting a text from his roommate to meet up on campus, the check found its way back to where it belonged. David, you're welcome for not being evicted this month. Don't give your rent check to your roommate ever again. Ever.

Day Four Hundred Two

For those of you keeping track and thinking, "wow, Allison hasn't had car trouble in a while!"... Today remedied that. I waltzed out to my garage at 6:50 this morning, attempted to turn on my car, and it grumbled at me and died. Nothing says happy Monday like a 7am call to AAA. Thankfully it was only my battery, and I was able to get it jumped in time to get to campus for a 9am meeting. Thank you AAA for coming in clutch this morning, and thank you Christian Brothers Automotive for squeezing my car in without an appointment this afternoon to replace my battery. You're both wonderful, but I hope I don't have to see either of you again anytime soon for the sake of my car and my bank account.

As if the morning hadn't been ridiculous enough, I went over to grab a snack after my meeting and realized I had left my lunch in my car, which was parked in a lot over a mile away. This was my day.

If nothing else, this day made me realize that since moving to Texas I've gotten much better at handling unexpected situations and not dwelling on potentially stressful things. I'm certainly thankful for that.

Day Four Hundred One

I haven't posted on here since Tuesday. And it's because every evening since then has been so busy and exhausting that by the time it gets close to bedtime, I have a one track mind that does not include my blog.

Wednesday was concert day! Jon McLaughlin was playing a show at Stubb's BBQ, and it was impossible for me not to go. Have any of you listened to Jon McLaughlin? He's amazing, and even more so live. I've seen him twice now in the two most different venues on the face of the planet. In Seattle I saw him a Triple Door, where you reserved seats at tables, dressed nice, and were catered by a wait staff the entire night. In Austin...Stubb's BBQ. I don't think I even need to describe that this place was a lot less swanky, much smaller, and had no seating whatsoever. Regardless, they both had Jon McLaughlin, and that's all I need to convince me to go just about anywhere.

Thursday night was all about the Seahawks. Who absolutely dominated their game! It was wonderful. A little less wonderful - having to leave 30 minutes into the game to pick up my laptop from the Apple store. I dropped it off to get a new battery at 3pm, thinking it would be a quick fix. 4 hours later I finally lost my patience and called to ask if I would get it back that day, and was told it'd be done within the hour. Seriously, Apple? It takes you 5 hours to replace a laptop battery? I huffed in there wearing my Seahawks jersey and an expression that I hoped said "Make this quick, I have a game to get back to." Luckily the employee helping me also happened to be from Washington and understood my growing need to leave the store and find a TV. A couple mall kiosk people tried to stop me as I was speed-walking out to my car and I was able to dodge them while saying "I can't I have to get back to the game!" Mall people, do not get in my way when I'm trying to root for my Hawks.

Friday...Dad came into town! Then Saturday we had an all day birthday extravaganza for him. Lunch with friends, a visit to his dad, a trip to the Co-Op, meeting and getting photos with Longhorn and NFL football legend Earl Campbell, tailgate with more friends, then to top it all off, a wildly disappointing UT football game. Happy birthday, dad! Sorry the football team was such a massive failure, I'll smack them all on campus tomorrow.

Hanging out with Earl.

BERTHA!

Day Three Hundred Ninety Six

Guess what I did today?

Study.

One full chemistry textbook FINISHED. On to the next. Life is a dream.