Suchen nach meinem Weg.

It just hit me the other day. I'm done school. I'm no longer a student. I don't have to go back to school in the fall. I don't need to have my confirmation deposit in by August whatever. I'm done. Now, I'm sure you're thinking, "Um, DUH, Cass. We all know this, and you do too. You wrote a post about being done. What the crap are you on???" Well...now I'm freaking out, and am totally confused. I don't like Save-On. It's too repetitive, the customers are too much, and I hate the management. Ever seen "Office Space"? Pretty much covers it. It's not for me. I thought about taking a two-year diploma in Professional Writing at Macewan, but after much agonizing, I have decided that, while it would probably get me a job, I don't think it would really challenge me enough to keep me interested...plus, I don't think I would be going because I really really want to, but rather, because school is where I am comfortable. It is easy to stay where you are comfortable, even if you don't get anywhere--hence, the centuries spent at Second Cup. So my next choice is to go to an employment agency, and hope for something that doesn't suck. Even a being a receptionist would be better than where I am now...although I'm wishing that I had graduated with a more useful degree. When I tell people I'm an English major, they laugh and then ask, "Well...what do you plan to do with that?" I would LOVE to work for a newspaper or a magazine, but I'm not even really sure how to get there. UGH! This sucks. Russ is lucky. He's gonna be an accountant--not that he's lucky to get to be an accountant, as I'm sure Arden can attest to, but rather, that he knows what he can do with it. What good is a BA in ENGLISH?? Seriously, this sucks. On top of all this, I'm just feeling restless in general, which just makes everything else more trying... Mein Verstand ist im Tumult.

I'M DONE!!

So I'm done. DONE. I finished my last final this morning. Wow. Scary. Now I have to join the real world until I decide if I'm gonna go back. Wow. I'm done.

So That's Totally...awesome...

Ya know what's awesome?? Discovering that 4 of the classrooms that I spent everyday, for three years of university in are being redone to remove asbestos!!!! Isn't that great?!

Six Weeks and Counting...

I'm sitting in the drafty Business Atrium on campus right now...wasting time until my next class starts. It really sucks, because I have a class from 9am-10:20am, then I have NOTHING until 1pm!! Unfortunately, that is the only way that my timetable would work out. I only have six weeks until I'm DONE!! I can't wait. However, until then, I'm stuck spending copious quantities of time here on campus. I'm taking Women and World Religion, and C Lit of Popular Fiction...should be pretty easy. I had my C Lit class this morning. There are 11 people in the class! The prof seems cool enough, though a little flaky, but the class itself shouldn't be too bad. The great thing is that, the class is supposed to go until 10:10am, but instead, she tacked an extra ten minutes on the end of each class Monday to Thursday, so that we have NO CLASS on Fridays!! I think that's pretty sweet!
Ugh. I start closing shifts at the cup tonight. 4-11:30. Brutal. I hope the person I close with isn't a cow, or stupid, or anything. I'm a little nervous because they do things quite differently at this cup, and it's taking some getting used to...for instance, only one person actually works til 11:30. The other person is off at 11pm. I don't really know how that works, so tonight will be a learning experience. Luckily, the girl I'm working with closes all the time, so she will hopefully explain how things are done...anyways...I should get my reading done now so that I don't have to do it after work tonight. Only six weeks...

TRIUMPH IS MINE!!

I'M DONE!!!

Welcome Smeagol!

Russ and I finally got a car!! It is a cruddy but sturdy old Pontiac 6000, whom we have *lovingly* named Smeagol. Yup. We are giant Dork! So, tomorrow, I start at the new Cup...I'm still hoping for a different job, and I dropped off a few resumes, but for now I'll survive. I hope it doesn't suck. Now, I have to get down to studying for crappy crappy finals...I'm trying to figure out a way to get a semester's worth of reading for 3 classes done in 2 days...sparknotes anyone?? But anyways..I should really get down to business...ugh.

School Sucks, Dude.

I had a discouraging day...I got two papers back, and got two relatively mediochre marks. I didn't come close to failing, but I got a B+ and B- for what I thought to be an A and a B, respectively. I hate getting generic marks with nothing but arbitrary or vague comments on them. The problem is that the marks bother me, but I know I put no effort into preparing and writing them, and for one, I hadn't even read the book. Plus, these will be the last two English classes that I will theoretically have to take, EVER. That, and considering my lack of effort, I got off easy! I just really want to be done, and I really don't want to put in effort of any kind. On top of that, I've been feeling stressed and anxious lately, and I'm not sure why. Part of it is my deep-seated hatred for all things pretaining to second cup. Another part is that I really hate school right now. Blargh. Things suck right now, especially now that the whole boning and favoritism crap is going on at the Cup too. I just want to be done--school, work, this apartment, the drama. Mentally, I'm already done, and that is a dangerous state of mind to be in. So, as a warning to you all, especially the cuppies, if you have to work with me, you may need to be a mediater between me, and Chad, and customers, unless you would love to witness a figurative or literal bloodbath. Scary, huh?

Jane Austen Rocks.

Jane Austen blows my mind. How one person can write an infinite number of novels, yet have such similar characters, plots, themes...just mind-blowing...I do enjoy a good Jane Austen novel though...I read Pride and Prejudice when I was 10. It made more sense when I re-read it when I was 14 though. The new movie disappoints me and I haven't even seen it yet. They totally hacked the plot, and Kiera Knightley is not right to play Elizabeth Bennett. Besides. Colin Firth is the only man alive meant to play Darcy!

You know what I love? People whom you tell one thing to, so they do something completely different! For example, say I tell you that my work availability is only Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday, but I booked one date off, that happens to fall on a Tuesday. Would you ask me if I could work on that particular Tuesday, even though I wrote it down in the book-off book, a note to you, and a note on my permanent availability, even after I told you I had a midterm the next day? No? Would you ask me if I could work the following Wednesday, even though my availability specifically said that I was not available on Wednesdays, EVER!!!?? Would you try to make me feel guilty for not working on a Wednesday when I have school and have told you numerous times that I am not available to work on Wednesdays???? NO????!!!!!!!! Well then what the CRAP is wrong with people!!!!??????!!!!!! Is anyone else as fed up as I am? It's pretty bad when the general manager of three stores quits for a better job...what does that say about a lowly lead agent who hasn't had a raise in 2 years?? Man. I'm pathetic!!!

Oh well...I'll just pretend I'm the heroine of my own modern Austen novel...now if only I can convince Russ to be Colin Firth...

This Place is a Hole.

So here goes another story about our crappy apartment, and stupid landlord. The bathroom and kitchen floor have been slated to be replaced since...October. The landlord called before Christmas to tell us that they would be doing the floors on Dec. 19. When I got back into the city on the 28th, the floors were still not done. We went to Cold Lake. We got back on the 2nd, and the floors still weren't done. We then got a phone call on the 3rd, saying that the floors would be done on the 4th. They didn't show up. We got a call on the 5th, saying that they would be coming at 10am on the 6th. Russ and I got home from West Ed around 7...and the floors were STILL NOT DONE!!! So then we got a call on Sunday, that they would do the floors on Monday. Yeah. Right. So FINALLY, on Monday night the landlord called and said that they were going to be here at 11am on Tuesday. Well...they came...at 10am...and when Russ said that he thought that they had said 11, the landlord got all defensive and accused him of not listening to the message and putting everything back. By "everything", I mean, everything that was in the kitchen, dining room and bathroom. Russ said that nothing had been put back, and by that I mean that the dining room table, chairs, boxes of books, and everything was still all piled up in the living room. So Russ went to school. When we got back, the hall was filled with the stench of varnish, and our apartment door was unlocked. The landlord was still there, finishing with sealing the edges of the lino in the bathroom. He told us that instead of putting lino in the kitchen, they just took out the tiles and then he buffed down the (badly beaten-up) hardwood underneath and dumped a bucket of varnish on it. He told us that it said to put on a thin coat, let it dry, then put on another coat. However....he didn't have time to wait, so he just put on one really thick coat on. We put on a box fan to help it dry quicker. He was cleaning up as we left. When we got back, the entire floor of the building reeked of varnish. The varnish smell was so thick in the apartment that I had an instant migraine. We had to open the frickin' window! In JANUARY! On the day when the atmosphere decides that Edmonton needs snow!! It took the floor a while to dry, and the thick coat bubbled as it dried, so now the floor is so rough it feels like there is a thick layer of sand on it! Plus, there's a reason why the floor was covered up with tile. It is very battered. There's deep, nasty gashes on it where it looks like someone moved the stove back and forth 10 or 100 times, some of the wood looks almost in the process of rotting...however, we are past the point of caring. We'll be moving in April.
Classes have started, and this is my last full semester. So far, my classes are going to be a lot of work, but I really like all of my profs so far. I just hope that my new preoccupation with Gilmore Girls box sets doesn't get in the way of keeping up with my craploads of reading...

REVENGE OF INSOMNIA!!!

Sooooooo...it's...2:51am...and i'm still up. Why, you may ask, is Cass still up? Well, you guessed it! Her good friend Insomnia is back, with a vengence! I'm frickin' tired!! I stayed up until 1am yesterday to study for my classics 302 final...then i got up at 9am this morning to do more studying...i went to school at 12pm to do more studying...then i wrote my exam. Then i came home, exhausted, wanting desperately to sleep...and proceeded to lay in bed for an hour and a half, trying to sleep. No dice. So i watched a couple of movies, taking a break from studying (which i shall be doing all day tuesday and wednesday) and now, it's 3am, and i desperately want to sleep...but i CAN'T!!! I have been dealing with this since i was 12, but i had it under control for a while...now, since i'm stressed, and my body needs sleep, it refuses to sleep. Yup. Good times had by all. I'm gonna go lay in bed for a while, and try to beat my tired brain into submission...hopefully i'll have enough left to finish writing my finals...if not, i will be the girl on the news whose head exploded. Maybe my family could sue the school...weep...oh man! I have GOT to sleep!!! Wish me luck....

....Procrastination....

So here I am...procrastinating...i really should be writing the last three pages of my paper...because it has to be done today....and it isn't...but i opened this morning (i forgot how much i love morning shifts!) and i took a nap, and got some groceries, and did some dishes, and cleaned the bathroom, and had some lunch, and watched an episode or three of CSI:miami...and now its 6 and i STILL have three pages to write...all i want to do is watch CSI and play with my new laptop!! I named it tomato for now...it's ever so pretty! i really should get that paper done, because i have three finals next week, and i have to do all the reading for each class that i didn't do throughout the second half of the semester....because i procrastinated....i think tomorrow i'm going to do what Rebecca did and just go to the Cup and set up camp. But first i have to put some music on my computer, because it has none, which is sad. maybe i'll do that now...and then i'll have some supper...and then i'll finish my paper...or go see russ at work...which ever will be less productive...argh!! Okay. I'm going to finish my paper now...and i'll just put CSI on in the background. Yeah. I'm gonna do that....

Not Doing Homework Really Pays Off After All!

Today I was carrying around $2195.96 worth of cheques in my bookbag...don't worry...I didn't rob a store...Russ and I both received the Jason Lang Scholarship!! Yup. I'm $1000 richer. Apparently I had an average higher than 3.3 from last year. I don't remember doing any work, so I'm not sure how I managed that...but I'm not going to complain...
Yay. Money. I'm buying me a laptop. Yay.
That's all I have to say. I have to go to work soon. Yay.

Chaos Theory.

You'd think that after 3 years at U of A, I would have learned that you DON"T go to the bookstore in the first few days of school. If anyone has seen Shaun of the Dead, and remember the scene with all the zombies in front of the Winchester, that was how the bookstore was today. It was the worst I have ever seen!! No one seemed to understand the concept of lining up down the aisles, and instead clumped all over around the actual lines. Ugh. On the bright side of things, my profs aren't jerks, and most of my reading material is available online!! Which, for Cass, equals WAY less money spent on books!! And way fewer books to lug around!!! Hooray!!

IT IS FINISHED.

German is done. ForEVER. Now it will all fall out of my head. Hooray.

So sei es.

So my cool friend Katie, who is a pyrotechnician (she blows things up...) is moving to Calgary tomorrow. *sniff* And she is having a goodbye thing tonight...and I CAN'T go!! I'm pretty choked...stupid not-having-a-car...bah. Stupid work...whatever.

I am so freakin' sick of GERMAN! If I have to read one more stupid subjunctive phrase again, I'm going to light the textbook on fire! FIRE! I really don't mind closing shifts at work...but I feel like I am totally out of the loop in the socialialites of the Cup...thats right, SOCIALITIES! (I'm an English major, and I can make up my own words if I wanna!!)
Man am I depleted...I could curl up into a ball in a dark room and sleep for a month. That would be awesome...no work, no German, no nothing. Just sweet sweet sleep. The apartment is starting to actually look homey, even though there are still boxes everywhere...These two are the only ones that could be presentable so far...

Hier wird Deutsch vorlesen...schlecht.

If anyone tells you that taking 6 credits of reading German in 6 weeks is a good idea, RUN AWAY SCREAMING!!!!!! So German is not an easy language to read and translate. First of all, it has bloody genders, like French...who cares if the sun is masculine, or if the chair is feminine?? Really! It also has a case system. Four cases. ARGH! German is hard! Yup...and I have a midterm on Monday. A two and a half hour long MIDTERM. Yup. Maybe I should buy the german Glamour to practice....heh. I can't wait be done,to be able to return to opening shifts...although, i forgot that closing isn't bad, because its much more lax than a morning shift...maybe I'll just close once in a while.

I worked with Emily last night, and after close, we decided to put in some good music. So Emily, being the cool chick she is, pulls out her CD wallet and puts in Nightwish, which can be described as operatic metal...and man, oh man, they rock!! I totally got hooked! Which isn't that surprising, because I'm a serious music junkie...the mp3 collection on our computer has over 4000 songs!!!
So if anyone needs music, I'm the girl to talk to.

The date for the make up concert with DAVID USHER FINALLY was posted...he's coming back on July 17th...right before my birthday! (Although I'm pretty sure that it isn't scheduled then because of that...) I'm still waiting for his CD that I PREORDERED to show up...it was ordered over a month ago. I emailed them and they still haven't responded...so I have had to be content with downloading the album for now...but it's just not the same.

God Really Smiled on ME Today!

So on Mon, Wed, Fri, I have my Shakespeare class. Yesterday after class, my prof. caught me on my way out, and asked if I could have a meeting with him before next class, in regards to my paper that was due on Monday. So of course, I start instantly freaking out, in the wonderful way that I always do. I made a meeting with him for today @ 3pm. I spent all last night freaking out, fretting, going over my paper in my head. I was sick all weekend, and, being the marvolous procrastinator that I am, I was up until 3am Monday morning writing the stupid thing, all doped up on Contac C. I spent most of last night praying that it wasn't anything major...maybe that I had forgot to document a source that I cited on my Works Cited page, or even better, that he had me mistaken for another person in my group. ( I don't talk much in class, so I think that the only way he would know me is through my group that I sit with every class...) So, needless to say, I didn't get much sleep last night, and I sat freaking out through all of my classes today, and right through the meeting. I sat down with my prof, and he asked me about a particular passage in the paper, and said it sounded odd, and asked if it was from a secondary source. I didn't recognize the passage, but I told him the whole story about being sick and out of it, with the idea that handing in a crappy paper was better than not handing in anything at all. So he asked me to take the paper home, check for things that should be credited to a secondary source, and bring in all of the sources. Okay...I can do that. So I get home, and start skimming it. And I'm not getting any of it. I honestly don't remember writing any of it, but I was REALLY out of it...
And then I started noticing all kinds of grammatical errors...and so I turn to the front...and it WASN'T MY PAPER!!!!!!!!!!!! It was a paper by one of the girls that sits next to me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
He never actually called me by name, and I didn't get a chance to actually look at the paper until I got home. And IT WASN'T MY PAPER!!!!!!!! So I frantically emailed him, and tried to call his office, but he had already left for the day...so now I not only have to give him this girl's paper, but I look like a total retard for not recognizing that the paper wasn't mine! I cannot stress enough that I was really sick and doped up on Contac C. (If anyone has seen me on Contac C, you'll understand...) So all that prayin' paid off...it really was a big mistake!! Of course, of all the people I know...this stuff always happens to me...Steve was right when he once told me that my life is one giant soap opera...

Oh yeah. HAPPY ST. PADDY'S DAY!! (gotta keep connected to my Irish roots...)

Stupid Computer...Whatever...

So now I have decided that the Sims are minions of Satan. Well, that may be an exaggeration...but they DID crash the computer, so I have decided that I shall wash my hands of Reno and Vendetta Stitch. For now....
I have been looking at the building across the alley from time to time, and have noticed that one of the balcony has an extra bar around the top of it...I wonder what purpose it serves, and what makes that balcony so special that it has that little extra bit of metal?
As it is plain to see, I really do NOT want to read the first act of Hamlet again, and am looking for distractions. I'm tired of being in school, but I don't really want to be done yet, because that means I have to find a REAL job...maybe I'll become a professional student and try to get more letters after my name than are in my name. Such an ambitious goal...or a stupid one...

Marks.

It feels so great to be done the semester....it's been a long haul...
I just checked my marks, and I got a B in my American literature class!!!! (That was the class with the scary prof, who I thought was going to fail me because I didn't agree with her...but obviously not!) It's such an exhilarating feeling to do okay in a class that you were sure you would fail...
I can't wait to go home for Christmas, but the problem with going home means that I'm not going to want to return to Edmonton and work after....oh well..
I don't have much else to say...so i'm gonna go read.

I Think I Have the BrainRot...

I'm supposed to be writing an excessively long literary review on anorexia nervosa for my medical anthropology class, complete with an annotated bibliography...due tuesday...however, I have a final on tuesday as well, so I have to have the paper finished by Monday so that I can study for the final. (Hooray for Faulknerian sentences!!) I haven't started it yet...in fact, I haven't even got all my sources together yet...and now I am writing a post...Hooray for procrastination!! I can't wait for this semester to be over...I hope that next semester doesn't suck mooseballs...My classes appear to be potentially interesting, so we shall see.

I'm so proud of myself! I have over half of my Christmas shopping done!! I think that it is a great feeling to have all my shopping done...I'll have to wait until after the 7th to finish though, because by then, I will be done school for the semester!! It is snowing out...I have mixed feelings about that, because it never feels like Christmas without snow, but it was so WARM!!! Oh well...so it goes. I must say that I am getting sick of Christmas music though...we aren't allowed to play anything BUT at the Cup, and there are only so many songs available...so yeah...

I'm addicted to online shopping. Especially sephora and amazon...they are so great...and it actually is a good thing in terms of purchasing because I have to really decide whether or not I want something before ordering, plus I can get stuff that is hard-to-find or inaccessible for me...I highly recommend it...if you have a small amount of willpower, that is. I just bought the new Rammstein album, Reise, Reise. I love them!! There's something about a bunch of dorky guys singing in german...

Wow...I'm really rambling about nothing now...shows how much I DON'T want to work on that stupid paper....However... I think my OVID session is gonna time-out soon, so gotta get back to it...