Blah blah blah. School's been going well. We got a new GM at work recently. Changed a lot of things, but overall it hasn't been too bad. Things are a lot more organized it seems, but everything is in a different place so it's just been a ride trying to get used to the changes.

Been thinking about participating in my university's Costa Rica program next summer (in 2011). It's a month-long trip to Costa Rica, where we would attend Spanish classes, live with a non English-speaking host family (or 2 of them to be more precise), and also be able to visit some cultural sites and touristy stuff while we're at it. It's kind of expensive though, which is why I'll have to wait until next summer to sign up, but another reason is that I think I'd feel a bit more comfortable with my Spanish after taking 2 more semesters of classes. I think it'll be a great experience, but I'll have to talk more with my advisor I think before I go through with it. I don't know if it would be good as a replacement for a semester-abroad or provides the most benefit as a supplement experience to prepare for a longer semester abroad. The classes we take are intensive summer classes, which meet every weekday, so I wouldn't be worried about the lack of credit hours as far as comparing it to a full semester. I'm not required to study abroad as far as I know, even though I'm an International Business major, but I want to as I feel it'll help my Spanish immensely and would also look good for future job opportunities.

In other news, I ordered a computer the other day to prepare for the upcoming release of StarCraft 2. Lookin' forward to it greatly... I know I'll be spending my whole summer playing that!

Work was killer this weekend. I spent about 25 hours between Sat and Sun, which made me feel like I lived there. At least someone brought candy on Sunday which significantly helped me get through the last half of the shift with a major sugar rush, although I came down off of it well before my shift ended.

Now, a few days off to relax, although I still have to read chapters in Microeconomics and Managerial Accounting soon. I should've read them by today, but due to the work situation there's no way I could've managed that this weekend.

So my business stats teacher is pretty terrible. I knew from the start of the semester that she's scatterbrained and doesn't have a great grasp on what's she's doing, but I figured her just looking over the material before her lesson would be adequate enough of a refresher, right? Well, that's not the case. She's made constant mistakes throughout the semester, but today, boy, well, not only did she mistakenly use two different incorrect formulas, but she forgot an important step in a relatively long Standard Deviation problem after she "completed" it. To top it off, when the class called her out on this oversight, she exclaimed loudly, "Dammit, motherfucker." I've considered complaining about her incompetence, but I figure I should just wait until we do course evaluations later in the semester. I've rarely ever given bad reviews to instructors before, or written much about them in the comments section, but after only a few weeks into this term, I have a page fulll already.

In other news, I'm trying to cut back on my monthly bills to try to save up some money. My current phone still has 1 year left in its contract, but it costs me about $90/month, which costs much more than what I use it for. Especially considering AT&T doesn't offer 3G here in Jonesboro, having a smartphone with a data plan just seems a little unnecessary since I rarely use the Internet on it because it's so slow. Sprint has a decent plan for $30 a month for 200 anytime minutes, which is all I need anyway since I'm not a big caller. I just don't know if I want to get into another contract at this point. Plus, I'd still have to buy my way out of my current contract which would be about $130ish. Whatever I decide to choose though, pretty much anything will be cheaper than what I'm paying now.

I saw a documentary recently called The Cove and was blown away by its message. Over 20,000 dolphins and porpoises are slaughtered in Taiji, Japan every year. The end is one of the most powerful scenes I've seen in any movie, whether it be a scripted film or a documentary. There were many beautiful scenes in the movie which I was heartened by, but then a few minutes later there were many that made me feel both angry and sad. I certainly hope that this documentary will make a difference in the treatment of these animals before it has become too late.

I have been making a solid attempt at rolling my Rs these last few days, yet so far I've had no luck. It's been a difficult task for me, and I remember now why I pretty much gave up each time I've tried before this. Hopefully, I'll be able to do it with enough practice. I've read conflicting accounts of genetics being an issue with learning trilling, but I hope I am not subject to that case.

Well, I recently got an email giving me a 3-month subscription for free in the hopes that I will continue to subscribe after that free period is over, so I'm back, at least temporarily. I hope I have the time to make use of this fully, but I've been busy with school, as I'm now strictly taking major-related classes so they're a bit more important than, say, Gen Chem I. Also, I think most of us can agree that this place has had a lot of great times, but it just doesn't have the same kind of feel about it these days. I've been rereading old journal posts and comments and old threads in my regional forum which has brought up some things I'd forgotten about, which has been nice. I haven't had the opportunity to look into which of my favorite SGs are still here, but I hope I'm not too disappointed in that regard! Well, that's all for now. I'll make a good attempt at post semi-regularly!

I figured I might as well add a new post since it has been three months since I last posted. Things have been going okay. I get a two week vacation coming up soon, although I don't know if I want to take the entire two weeks or just one and cash the other week in instead. I suppose the money couldn't hurt, and one week is plenty anyway, so I think I am going to go that route. The week the fall semester starts sounds like as good a time as any to take it since I have no special excursion planned later in the year.

One of my friends, Jeremy, is heading off to Navy bootcamp in a few weeks. I'm gonna miss him, and I wish him the best of luck. We're going to go camping/rafting next weekend to celebrate the last few weeks we'll see him as a regular citizen. I've been never before, so I'm especially excited. I believe we're going to be going to Spring River. I remember planning to go there when I was a kid with one of my friends and his parents, but some disagreement came up between my mom and my friend's parents (as far as I remember) so I didn't end up getting to go. I was disappointed, but it looks like I'll get the chance this time.

My 5 year anniversary to SG is coming up soon (counting the hiatus I had). It's really hard to imagine that I've been here this long. It's nostalgic to reminisce on all of the memories I have of the community here. Overall, I'd say it's been a blast.

So I was thinking about this movie today about a guy named Gus. I don't remember much about him other than he was bald. Apparently, he was interested in this girl who wasn't interested back, so he had a makeover of sorts and came back to her as a different person to woo her over. I thought the name of it was "Gus," but apparently I was mistaken. After doing a lot of searching, I found Motorama. Obviously, not the correct movie, but it's one I've been thinking about every now and again for a very long time. How weird that I found it when I wasn't even looking for it. I'm sure the only reason is because the main character's name in that movie is also Gus.

After a little bit more searching, I came across the one I was looking for, Don't Tell Her It's me. It seems as though it's gone through a name change to the title originally used by the novel off which it is based, The Boyfriend School. Anyway, I added both of these to my Netflix queue to see them soon! I think my great searching skills deserve an award: it surely wasn't easy.

Registered for classes for the fall today.

Intermediate Spanish I
General Chemistry I and its lab
Intro to Financial Accounting
Business Cal

Should be an interesting semester. Found out I have about $700ish worth of vacation pay at work. That means I can take a couple weeks off if I like. Wonder when I should do that... hmmm.

The Horrorpops are playing at Vino's May 11th. That's super exciting. I've been a fan for a few years but didn't think I'd get the chance to ever see them live. Definitely looking forward to that show. Hopefully nothing goes wonky and makes me miss this one!

School has been going all right. Outside of school, there has been nothing interesting to talk about really. I guess the most notable thing is my WoW account was hacked a little over a week ago. Still haven't got all of my stuff back yet. But it has allowed me to do a lot more things outside of that little niche. I've been using Netflix a lot more, and finally got around to watching a movie or two that has been sitting on my desk here for who knows how long. I also got around to finishing The Curious Incident of the Dog in te Night-Time. I read most of it soon after I got it, but put off the last 30 or so pages for a long time. I tend to do that a lot. Been watching a lot of Lost lately too. I'm in the middle of season 3 right now. It's a good show, but the story progresses really slowly. There are many flashbacks that fill up a lot of space. Some of them relate to things that seem to be important to the main story (from my perspective anyway), although there are others that don't, at least yet. Maybe they fit in at a later point. But yeah, I guess I've just been watching a lot of stuff recently.

Well, that's all I have for now.