Soon the stress will be over. One paper, one final, and one hopefully nice premiere.

Things in St. Louis to do before I die. Other cities, too. Realized that I've only done one out of the five. Well, two, but I don't remember the one, so I don't think it counts. Where has the time gone?

Slightly freaked out about the orgo paper due tomorrow. Am hoping to leave early so I can catch the tail end of time at the chemistry library, which, in wonderfully ironic fashion, closes at 5 on fridays instead of the 10 pm it closes on every other day of the week. bugger.

Posted by Jen at 12:39 PM | Permalink

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  Kingdom of the Grail
file under: education

When you encounter difficulties and contradictions, do not try to break them; bend them with gentleness and time. --St. Francis de Sales

Yes, well, my contradictions and difficulties could cost me points on my orgo lab grade. boo. So you've heard me gripe about the orgo lab before, how we have to identify some unknowns, a hydrocarbon, an amine, and a carbonyl. So the hydrocarbon we just had to say, yup, this is a hydrocarbon, and that's it. The other two I have narrowed down to two choices, and supposedly the extra spectral data we got last week was supposed to definitively identify one compound. Well. Sort of. I *think* I know what I've got, but I have (heh) contradictory evidence that says, no, really you don't. Bugger. And I still have to write this paper, whether I have the right answer or not. House of cards, if there ever was one. All balancing on the hope that I choose the right set of data to believe.

At least I have the really cool Making of Kingdom of Heaven to keep me happy. Reading it while the soundtrack is playing is just too good for words. Better than orgo lab, anyway. (and in case you were wondering...the orgo test went...okay. Better than the last test, which was almost an utter bomb, but if I did better then most of the class probably did better. Guess we'll see.)

Posted by Jen at 5:26 PM | Permalink

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file under: education

Our task is to make ourselves architects of the future. --Jomo Jenyatta

Last night I got the Kingdom of Heaven soundtrack, and listened to it three times. It's either very popular or didn't ship enough, because the first place I went to didn't have it, so I was forced *hah* to go to Borders, and even they only had one copy. Then of course I was forced to get the only (slightly beat-up) copy of Empire magazine that has OB on the cover, and forced to get the Making Of KOH book that is so pretty. Forced, I tell you. But all day yesterday I was anxious to leave work and get to the store so I could have the soundtrack. For those of you who know me, I love my movie soundtracks, I probably have more of them than regular 'popular' music. This particular score is very good, reminiscent of 'Children of Dune' and, oddly enough, 'Shakespeare in Love.' Both of which are quite stellar, so it's nice to have something going for the movie already. It's almost as good as seeing the movie. Of course, nothing can top seeing OB's face on the movie screen, larger than life. Let's hear it for a 30-second love scene! :lol:

I do hope that this goes well. The soundtrack is great, but of course that means nothing for the movie, really. It's Orli's first starring role and I do hope that he carries it off well. Good luck, my man

Orgo test tonight. Eep. Wish me luck. Then I get to go home and start writing the orgo lab paper. Sigh. Next week, I keep telling myself. Next week, there will be no more orgo lab and there will be Orlando. Yes. Next week.

Posted by Jen at 10:31 AM | Permalink

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  Kingdom of Heaven soundtrack

file under: orlando

yes, it's true, this site has been around for three years. Amazing. I remember that I had just gotten back from the outdoor conference at Emory (where I won gold! Which I still find amazing.) and finished my last class, and I said, dammit, I will have a website, and it will be etoiline (dot) com, and yea verily it was so. I'm sure you remember how I had totally forgotten that it was my parents' anniversary. And last year I realized it was Kate's birthday. So many happy things going on today!

unfortunately I will have to spend most of the day studying. I might try to head over to the track to see the finals of some events on the track (ironic, isn't it, that this is the weekend of conference, right here at WU?) but then again, I might not.

Spend the evening at Kate's after spending far too much time at lab (which I'm still worried about) and catching some of the prelim events at the track with Alex. At Kate's there was good food and friends (some of whom might see KOH with me! Yahoo! And re: KOH, have more pictures. A layout is forthcoming, I hope!) and Mystery, Alaska, a hockey movie that was surprisingly good and had rather sweeping music by Carter Burwell of A Knight's Tale fame. Will have to put that on my list of soundtracks to get on Tuesday

Wish me luck with studying. I shall need it. And I do hope that I remember to spend time with orgo lab! Dear Lord help me through this week, please.

Posted by Jen at 1:54 AM | Permalink |

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  Dave Matthews Band: Pig

file under: celebration

It's the 35th Earth Day today. Recycle something. Reuse something. Er, Reduce something. *laughs half-heartedly at the organic chemistry joke she just made* Orgo is driving me mad.

One more Saturday lab, then write the paper for Check-out a week from tomorrow. Orgo test next week, which not quite ready for, and might not be before next week, as friends coming into town. Yay friends. Boo not studying. Thank goodness test is on Wednesday and not Monday.

Orgo final May 11. Thank goodness no orgo lab final, as would have been the day after Kingdom of Heaven premiere. KOH's soundtrack out Tuesday, shall have to pick that up along with Rob Thomas' solo effort.

So, it's the parents' anniversary, Kate's birthday, and yours truly's website's 3rd birthday on Sunday. Awww. Also, sunday being the full-moon day, BPAL will offer Flower Moon. Will have to see if I remember to check it out. Could be interesting. Will be busy. Hope I can see some of the UAA conference meet this weekend, as it's held at WU this year. Strange to think that three years ago I was in Atlanta and running the best races of my life, becoming conference champion in both the 100 and 200 m dashes, placing 3rd in the 100 hurdles, and helping the 4x1 team win gold and nearly make it to nationals. Wow. What a difference three years makes. *cough* *lazy bum*

Still worried about orgo lab. I guess I've done what I needed to do, but hopefully will get all needed things done tomorrow. These last few weeks I've just felt like I didn't know what I was doing. And I have no idea what to write this paper on. It will be a bitch. And since it's due three days after the aforementioned orgo test, it will be doubly bitchy. Wish me luck.

I just have to keep telling myself that there are good things coming my way, in the form of friends and new music and Orlando Bloom, but man, it's hard when there's the stress of orgo/job/apartment worries. I'd really like to know where I'll be in a month.

Posted by Jen at 5:31 PM | Permalink |

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  The Closing of the Year, Toys soundtrack

file under: thoughts

so I've determined that for some odd reason AIM doesn't want to let me change my buddy icons on my laptop. Boo. I might have to reinstall it, see if that works. Weird.

Another weird thing, on saturday morning as I was leaving for lab, I noticed something out of the corner of my eye under the tire of a car parked near my apartment. I looked back and saw it was a rather big something, but I didn't have time to take a closer look. The car was still there when I got back from lab, and this time I did take a better look: someone had run into the rear driver's side bumper, really hard, hard enough to drive some of the bumper over the rear driver's side wheel and another part of it under the front driver's side tire. That's what I'd seen earlier. You could tell it had been done there because there was all sorts of debris around the car, and it looked like it had been hard enough to bump the car up onto the (admittedly low) curb. When I came outside the next day someone else was looking at it and the person who lives in the house next door said that it had been a drunk hit-and-run, but it wasn't his car. I wonder whose it was, and if they knew about it over the weekend, because it didn't get towed until yesterday afternoon. It was a nice car, too.

While I was on my way to lab, I noticed this car parked horizontally across an alley, and I was like, "wow, that's rude," but then I saw that the entire front tire had been shredded. I mean, it looked like it had exploded, which is possibly what happened. I didn't have time to examine it, as I was driving, but when I came back after lab I had to stop at the stoplight and could look at it a little longer. I don't know what the person ran over, but wow. I guess the alley just happened to be the easiest way to stop, but I would have thought they could have pulled a little farther forward. At least the car wasn't totally blocking the way. I have no idea if it's been towed yet, I'd assume so, but it's kinda funny how I only go that route if I'm going directly to the hilltop from the apartment, which I only do on saturdays. Weird.

and just so you know, lab was terrible. I think I'm doing ok, but I didn't get out until quite late, and I feel really bad. It's probably going to reflect on my grade that I left late so many times. Boo. And of course, our paper is due a few days after our last test (not the final, but the fourth test). Of course. Just the luck.

I just have to keep telling myself, just a few more weeks. And there are some bright spots in there, like the Kingdom of Heaven premiere, parents' anniversary/Kate's birtday/friends in town/et.com turning 3 but there's two tests and a paper. Sigh. Still feel crappy.

Posted by Jen at 10:06 AM | Permalink |

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  The Soul Weaver, Carol Berg
file under: miscellany

Scotland's Lochs and Forests Trail | Adventure Travel & World Travel That link is for a HORSEBACK RIDING trip through SCOTLAND. OMB. *wibble* You have no idea how many levels that appeals to me on. Sigh. If only I had an extra $2000 lying around. Sheesh. I barely have enough to even think about seeing Big River at the Fox (which I really really want to, but no one can go with) much less a trip like that. Even my (very small) tax refund is already earmarked for a (working, non-squirrel-eaten) bike. Sigh.

I would pick up the Apple Symphony Jam Pack so I could lay down some nice tympani beats. Yeah. Also get *some* keyboard that would have MIDI input so I could play directly to the computer. I've got this lovely GarageBand software but it's so gosh-darned hard to "play" piano on a computer keyboard.

Want more?

I would spend a month or two or three just writing. I'm excited about Artorius Rex Novare again. I want to talk about it but I know all of you haven't read it, so I can't. Sigh. I want to fix Moonstone so it doesn't sound like a 13-year-old wrote it. Not that it was bad, but it could be better. I was a pretty smart 13-year-old, but obviously I can write much better now that I'm in my 20s.

I would go to Cedar Point in Sandusky Ohio and visit my lovely cousin Corey.

I would design lots of fangirl websites because I could. I would buy fun things like a video connector so I could watch/record things on my computer. Course, then I'd probably get DSL and cable.

I spent most of the free time I had today looking at pictures of Orlando, old and new. Dear Lord please let Kingdom of Heaven be as good as it looks!

I would fly to wherever Orlando is filming at the moment and meet him. And actually have a conversation.

I'd find a bunch of people who want to get wet and exhilarated (hey! pull your mind out of the gutter!) and take them all whitewater rafting. And climb a few mountains in Colorado.

I'd see several Broadway shows. And actually see New York, as opposed to the track of Rochester University, which is all I ever saw of the state.

Posted by Jen at 5:56 PM | Permalink |

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  Paul McCartney: Live and Let Die/Howie Day: Perfect Time of Day
  Orgo is waiting for me, but I just finished Son of Avonar, and I can't wait to start book 2...
file under: dreams

So today (yesterday, if you want to be technical about it) Luigi got back from his mini vacation (wish I had one of those) and not only did he give me an official form for submitting another paper, but after talking to him about the aforementioned performance 'U' he gave me a new evaluation with all "Satisfactory"s. Yay! Hopefully that will help my chances at getting another job at the university. I really want to stay.

I feel slightly proud of myself since I finally got my Easter present in use. My mom had gotten some risers for my bed at that home, so there would be room to store stuff underneath, and I expressed the thought that I would like some for that reason and lo and behold, about a week before Easter my dad packed me off for the apartment with some. He jumped the gun a little bit, but he's cute that way. So I finally set my bed up on them (having, of course, to fix the bedframe along the way). I didn't want to take the whole mattress set off the frame so I probably made it harder on myself than it needed to be, but yes, they're up. Damnit now I need to stay in the apartment since I got them set up and can store stuff more efficiently.

Got a message in reply to my month old post at the newsgroup about the roommate sitch, which was a little odd, and it was a guy, which I'm leery about, but there's the whole, I don't know if I'll be here when it comes time to renew, but yeah. I want this apartment! I like it here. I really don't want to have to move, even if my room at the 'rents place looks quite nice now.

Also got a message from a random Jewish boy from Tickle.com which was kinda cute. He started reading Moonstone. I'm almost embarrassed by the stuff that's up there, since it's all mostly stuff that was written when I was 13, even if it was revised four years ago. It's not *bad*, it's just not on par with what I wrote in a hurry last November for NaNo. One of these days I'll go back and try to fix it, but I should at least finish one big writing project before I try to overhaul the beginning.

And I'm sure you noticed the lovely KOH banner atop the posts. Clickity-click! You know you want to! I'll get my butt around to making a new KOH layout soon, in time for the premiere, I hope Lots of good choices now that the publicity kits are going out.

Posted by Jen at 12:33 AM | Permalink |

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  The Matrix Reloaded Disc Two

file under: working

I'm quite happy since I finally saw the musical 'Into the Woods' performed onstage again. Alas I wasn't it it, more's the pity. But the WU Performing Arts Department's performance of the musical was quite good. The sets were minimal but well-done, most of the singing was just as it should be, and the Princes were great. I was hoping that it would be good, since I remembered Into the Woods fondly from when it was performed at my high school freshman year (I was almost in it, until I realized that I didn't have enough time to practice the piano music to be in the orchestra, man that was a blow). But happily it lived up to my expectations. Yay.

I'm not happy because today's experiment in lab just left me drained, and I didn't finish some of the things I had to do. It's a three part lab, where we have to identify three unknown organic products. At least I have two weeks to finish it, and I know what class my compounds are in, but jeez. I still have to find melting and boiling points and do a Tollen's test, which might be pretty since it's supposed to indicate the presence of an aldehyde by precipitating silver on the sides of the test tube (yes, actual silver, the metal) but I don't think I have an aldehyde, so it might not be. boo. And my Hinsberg test while not a bust was quite 'flaky' to quote my professor. sheesh. I hope it ends up working.

Last week at work was a bit stressful since on tuesday I had an ELISA just fail on me. No results at all, not even bad ones. So of course we have to troubleshoot that. There is a chance it's something that I did, but I'm in the region on 98% sure that I followed the instructions properly. Of course the tech support people at the company don't want to say it might be their product, but this kit was among the first of a lot so it's possible that something's not working on their end. Of course, it seems that the only way to test the possible culprit is to do the test over again, the whole long test, which is a pain and also hard to justify because it would take up wells that we need to use for sample later. sigh. at least I finally have a transfer interview with human resources so I can get on finding a new job.

I'd like to be able to stay at WU, they have wonderful benefits and I really want to keep my apartment nearby. But obviously I need to have a job first before I can keep the apartment, but if I do find a job, I need to find a roommate as well, since Olga wants to move out to California with her boyfriend. (What is it with me and the trend of having roomies leaving to move in with bf's? same as me getting let go because there is no money, I guess. ah, irony). And the lease comes up in June, so I have to get on things. boo stress!

I still have to see Robots and Sin City. But we're closer and closer to Kingdom of Heaven! Yay!

Posted by Jen at 7:57 PM | Permalink |

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  Josh Groban: Remember Me (Troy Soundtrack)
  Son of Avonar, Carol Berg
file under: muses