Its Been A Really Long Time...

Hello, everyone!

I haven't really posted more than one or two blog posts this past semester.  The truth is, I haven't really had much to say!  I've been too busy actually enjoying my life and having a great time of it to actually sit down and take the time to share.  So, here is an overview of important things that have happened this semester:

• Straight As!  Whoo hoo!!!
• Internship at The Arbors has been going well!  I'll be ready when I get back for next semester to pick up the pace a little and continue making my time there as awesome as possible.
• Making leaps and bounds through the Netflix queue.  Since Netflix split up its plan with the price increases, I've been subscribed online to the stream online plan.  Once I watch everything I can get through instant streaming, I'll switch to the physical disc mailing plan.  My most recent love has been How I Met Your Mother.  Words cannot describe...
• Grocery shopping and paying bills worked out awesome with my refund from the school up until the last 3 weeks.  I'll need to rethink that for next time.. Haha!
• Ryan and I are still going strong!  We sailed through our 5, 6, 7, and 8 month anniversaries.  April 5th of 2012 will mark our 1 year as an official couple!  YEEAHHHH!!!
• I bought fish!  I started off the summer with 5 guppies.  One died from the stress of the transfer from the store to my tank.  Then there were 4: Cappie (the only one with visible distinguishable marks), and "The Supremes" (the other 3 look-alikes).  Unfortunately now we're down to only two of the Supremes left (whom I have now dubbed Killer and Donna).  **Note, all my guppies were males--however, you have to admit that Cappie and The Supremes is kind of catchy...**  AND the newest addition to the family is a beta named Emmett.  He has his own tank and his own life, and I think that makes him happy.
• Space (my car) has thrived and deteriorated and thrived again!  We're hanging in the balance at around 160,000 miles.  We have winter tires but no snow....and we have oil and antifreeze that remains within the inner workings of the vehicle.  Win for all involved.
• Excellent drunken house parties have occurred: the very realistic Prohibition 1920s Speakeasy (where many of the attendees were underage [of course, this is college] so we all hid in the basement to manage the noise levels-good times), the famous Mustache party (yep-you guessed it. Mustache mandatory for attendance), ALL of Halloween weekend (3 parties in 2 days-not bad!), the quietish Christmas party between close Burlington-bound people in my life, and of course the other various nights that involved going to bars or staying in and mixing fun drinks by ourselves!
• Very few stressful nights worrying about homework and how I'm going to manage all of my classwork plus life in general.  4 classes per semester is PERFECT!  I'm so glad I put in all my hard times my Freshman/Sophomore years.  Senior year is a breeze so far, and I'm loving every second of it!  Sure there have been a few downs or hiccups in the general flow of things, but speaking overall, this has really been my best semester at Champlain so far.
• Oh, and I totally taught myself how to knit over Thanksgiving break via YouTube videos.  Oh yeah.  New life skills FOR THE WIN!

I'm so happy that this year has been going so well.  I can't imagine what this year would have been like with a schedule like my Spring semester of Sophomore year.  (That was when I broke up with Luke, was managing a 12 hr/wk unpaid internship, working as a Peer Advisor for as many hours/wk as was necessary, as well as working ~10hrs/wk for my mandatory work-study hours so I could have a paycheck).  I really wasn't sure I was going to make it that semester.  BUT-I did, and I'm stronger for it.  

I'm proud of myself for all I have accomplished so far.  I work damn hard and I deserve a lot of respect for all I do.  What is next on my list is to start applying for grad schools:  Boston University, Springfield College, University of Vermont, University of New Hampshire.  I'm working on getting all of my required application materials together over this break, and sending them out quite soon once I return to Burlington/Winooski.  

Lastly: I have been a busy beaver over break.  I got home on Friday evening, and it is now Tuesday.  In this time, my mother and I have switched bedrooms.  I'm enjoying being home SO much more.  I don't feel so depressed and aimless as I thought I would.  A big project like this is just what I needed to keep myself busy and motivated.  I seriously got rid of about 5 bags of garbage, and donated another 5 or so to the Salvation Army.  The reason for this is that my old room was about 1/2 the size of the basement (about 1/4 of the entire house).  I moved from this big room to my moms normal-sized bedroom that actually has windows!  She moved into the bigger room.  Therefore, I needed to really focus on getting rid of a lot of my old stuff so that it would all fit into this new, smaller, more manageable room.  I cleaned out everything: stuff from past boyfriends that have been sitting or buried in my room, things I haven't touched or worried about in years, stuff I thought I would definitely need/use but never got around to, and even some stuff I had been emotionally attached to.  However, it was time to let it all go, to let it be free.  While I may still have another bag or two of trash to take out, I feel great!  Cleansed.  Like I'm getting rid of everything so that whatever comes after Champlain will have room to take hold and lead me to where I'm supposed to be-without leaving too much behind.  So far both my mother and I seem happy with the trade.

Well, this wraps everything up rather nicely from the past 4 months of my life.  I feel like I need to find a new purpose for blogging again.  I wish I could be as dedicated as other folks in writing a fabulous blog-stuff other people actually care about instead of something that looks like a journal of my life.  I will gladly accept any and all blogging ideas and suggestions below.  Tell me what you'd most want to hear/learn about!  If it is something that lines up well with my interests or knowledge and expertise, I will try to move the blog in that direction--and work on posting more frequently.  :)

Auf Wiedersehen!

It's Been A While

Hello, everyone!

So, with my laptop finally back in my possession, life is good again.  As of Friday I will be totally ALL caught up on my homework, and I'll be in a good place.

Speaking of Friday, our beloved Eden is coming from 4 hours away at PSU to stay here in Burlington with Ryan and I for the weekend!  This is the first time she'll have been able to see the UVM/Champlain campuses (campii?) from the Meg Ryan point of view.  It is going to be spectacular.  :)

In other news, I've been very gluttonous the past few days.  It sucks.  I need to kick it up a notch.  I was treated by Res Life to an amazing dinner at the Olive Garden last night, and I ate soooo much.  And Ryan got me a bag of Lindor Milk Chocolate truffles....which are mostly gone.  So...needless to say...I should maybe do some crunches tonight?!  I need to lose this weight!!! Even if I have to find a way to shake and shimmy every night for an hour or so!

Another factoid of my life: I may or may not be able to get a car over Spring Break.  So, here's the deal.  My 21st birthday falls on Spring Break from college.  This year (along with receiving the legal right to drink alcohol,) my mother was planning to get me my first car EVER!!!!! WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT!!!!  BUT-this is all dependant on when she gets her Federal Tax Refund back.  She sent her forms out about 2 weeks ago, and they JUST got there the day before last.  Um...what?  Post office fail or federal government fail?  Maybe both.  They're the same thing, really. 

Soooo...here's my deal.  I thought I would finally have the chance to feel like I'm on equal footing (or tires?) with everyone else my age.  I've been driving my mothers car since I was 15.  It's really hard to hear other kids saying "Oh, let's just take my car" as if it's no big deal for 6 years.  It gets old after a while.  It shouldn't be such a touchy subject, but for those who don't have something that everyone else takes for granted...it's frustrating. 

Having a car is something that Vermont kids (especially) place a lot of value on.  Having your first car means you can finally have freedom.  Because it takes at LEAST a 15 minute drive to get anywhere worthwhile in VT, if you don't have a car, you're pretty much stuck.  I'm so sick of having to depend on other people's schedules and moods to determine whether or not I get to go somewhere.  I've dealt with it for 21 years of my life, the past 6 of which have felt extremely long.  I want to be a normal person with a car!  I would like to not have to depend on stupid bus schedules or mooch off friends for rides to the grocery store!  I would like to not have to barter with my mother during my breaks from school about if she has to work tomorrow, and if I can borrow her car. 

Long story short...this has been a long time coming.  I feel like a donkey with a carrot being dangled in my face.  The federal government better get their $H!T together and hurry up with my mother's refund so I can stop feeling like an inadequate college student.  Please and thank you.

(One vehicle my mom told me about was for sale in W. Rutland or somesuchplace.  It's a black Saturn Vue.  My mom currently has a blue one, but black works for me too!  We're looking into getting a standard because I have so much fun driving a stick shift.  Here's what one will potentially look like:)

Cute, right?  :)

I'm going to do my best to be patient.  I mean, even if I don't get the vehicle (which I really hope I do...otherwise some other plans of mine might be a little screwed...) I can still do this:

FYI...my mother has plans to get me drunk.  It's been a plan in motion since I was 9.  :)

SO-I hope this catches you up to where I'm at in life.  I have missed Blogger!  It feels good to write this out of my system.  <3

Until next time...
May the road rise to meet you (but not too quickly...)
XOXO
-Megan

Netflix Queue

Hello, Blogosphere!

Today I'm here to chat with you all about Netflix, and what my queue currently looks like. 

Back in October, I finally decided that I was sick of trying to (illegally) stream videos and things to watch when I got bored (and deal with the stress of wondering if I had infected my computer with a virus in the process,) so I decided to give Netflix a try after noticing that it really wasn't a scam, and that many of my college counterparts are also signed up.

Long story short, I LOVED it.  I quickly went through and found literally hundreds of titles that I've wanted to see but haven't had the chance, as well as oldies but goodies.  Unfortunately, my excitement was capped when I reached the 500 title limit for the queue.  Hahahaha.  Awesome.

Since then, I've been working hard to bring down the queue to a more manageable level, which is sometimes really rather difficult considering some of the other stuff I have on my list (separate from the queue) consists of about 40 television shows I've wanted to see or have heard pretty good things about, but never had time/was able to sit down and watch them as they were aired on television. 

Now-I'm making up for lost time.  At 500 movies and 40 television shows (not counting the many seasons some of them have,) I definitely have my work cut out for me.

Now, what's taking so long?  Well, when I signed up for Netflix I told Ryan we would be able to watch a lot of these movies together, and when we were both satisfied, we could delete the title from the queue.  That turned out to be a much more difficult process than originally intended.  Our schedules are both very hectic, so it's becoming a 'Megan-watches-a-movie-and-rates-it-and-when-Ryan-watches-it-he-can-delete-it-from-the-Queue' sort of process.  Currently, I'm at about 450-something movies in the physical queue (the ones that physically get sent to your mailbox,) and about 48 titles in the Instant Watch queue.

In short-we're working on it.  :)  There's a LOT of really great media out there, and I'm proud to be supporting Netflix with my business.  They have an amazing company, and I think I'll be registered with them until the day I die (or run out of movies and television shows to watch.) 

XXOO

-Megan

I'm Addicted

I feel like my blog is my baby.  I keep coming back to check on it every time I get the chance, even when I should be doing other things (like trying to write this 10 page paper before I have to leave and do my break.)  I mean, I technically could do it all on Saturday while I'm home before I leave for FLORIDA (I can't say that enough,) but who really wants to do homework on the first real day of break?  Seriously?!

Anywho, I keep hoping for more comments and readers, which is probably what has sparked me to write about 3 blog posts in 24 hours.  Would that help, perhaps?  If I treated my blog like I do my cell phone, Twitter, or Facebook, then we'd have a serious epidemic going on here--but at least I might have readers!!! <3

Until then, I'll keep popping back in to see what activity has taken place.  Do me a favor and surprise me someday.  :)

XXOO

<3 Megan <3

1/2 Fail

Hellllllllllllllllllllloooooooooooo Blogosphere!

So-I have some news.  I half failed this past week.  Now, I've been EXTRAORDINARILY active.  Like, walking nonstop to and from the U-Mall, but...I have some bad news.

Somehow I managed to gain 10 lbs in a week.  Yeah....I know, right?  Despite having walked literally half my ass off (which is sad because I LOOOVE my butt,) I still managed to gain all that weight.  Now-I didn't splurge in copious amounts or anything like that.  My theory is that since I've been so active, I've been building muscle.  My grandmother's theory is something to do with water retention and the fact that last week was 90 degrees every single day, and something or other to that effect.  Maybe it's both?  I'm not sure.  Either way, I know I'm slimmer (see "Looking Down: I See Boobs"), but it sucks that I still have to carry all this extra crappy weight around with me.

Zumba is still going wonderfully.  Lisa is my instructor here on campus.  (We took Kickboxing together last year.)  Zumba is much more fun, though.  :)  I am always so tired on my way to Zumba, but by the time I leave I've been sweating and the endorphins have kicked in, so it makes the rest of the night go easier. 

On another note....Whale's Tails!!!!  Ryan's recounting of this excellent trip is here; Ashley's is here.

This sums up the Meg Ryan relationship...

See!  I'm not lying.  I have lost some of my tummy!

Mmmm hmmm.

Effing Adorable.

Originally Ashley Ryan and I had decided that Sundays we would use to explore our area via hiking, or doing some other bonding activity.  Ryan and I were going to show Ashley our "spot" that we found last year this Sunday, but instead after looking through What's Good (a little booklet 7Days puts out at the beginning of every school year for us kids,) we found that there's a secret path up to actually touch the Whales' Tails that can be seen coming North on I-89.  So, we decided that for 20-30 minutes we would wave at traffic.  Another Megan in my COR class and I randomly came across each other in Dirt Chic downtown (another place we decided to explore,) and I later found out that Megan saw us while we were at the Whale's Tails.  WHOA.  Welcome to VT-small world.

All in all, the Whale's Tails trip was a success.  Plus, multiple double rainbows showed up.  (Check here for the musical rendition.)  It was wonderful. 

What wasn't a success however was getting a ride back to campus.  The CCTA bus decided it was totally okay to be 25-30 minutes late.  Which would have been fine, had it not started raining.  5 minutes before the water started falling from the sky:

Yes, we're sitting in the grass waiting for the bus.  Soon after Ashley took this picture, the Heavens opened up and water splashed everywhere.  It was an ugly experience.  After making a call to Sketchy Josh to come pick us up, the bus decides it's an awesome time to show up.  Obviously.  This followed by a text to Sketchy Josh telling him he doesn't have to pick us up and waiting the next 40 minutes to get back to campus= a really bad trying to get home trip.  I mean, obviously it was great in that the memories will be there forever.  But-it was cold and wet.  Oh well, at least we got to order Wings (Honey BBQ Chicken Wrap with Cheesy Waffle Fries,) and marvel in the fact that we made it back alive.

Ahhh....the tales of epic travels.

Until next time.

-Megan

Mr. Scarborough: Part 2

Copied and pasted from FaceBook!  Hope you all enjoy!

First off, thanks to all of you who are interested in what's going on with Mr. Scarborough, and for all your continued support. Many of you have been SUPEREXCITED to hear how my trip to Maine went, so here's a glimpse to hopefully satisfy all of you. :)




_____ _____ _____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ ____



Ding! Ding! Round two! On Tuesday I took a nice, short, leisurely 3.5 hour drive to Scarborough, ME to see Mitchell (formerly Mr. Scarborough.)



Before the fact, I again woke up 2 hrs before I had scheduled myself to leave and commenced with my preparation for the day. 30 minutes to wake up and eat breakfast, 2 minutes deciding what to wear, 15 minutes in the shower, 10 minutes actually getting dressed and brushing hair and teeth (not with the same brush, mind you,) 5 minutes double checking the ingredient lists on my shamoo, lotions, and deoderant to make sure nothing contained anything coconut (Mitchell is allergic. [:(]), 3 minutes finding and applying mascara (which again doesn't happen often-but it adds that extra oomph,) 20 minutes running around gathering items to throw in a bag "just in case," 10 minutes assuring my grandmother I'll be fine and not to worry, 10 minutes at Cumby's to gas up and grab a lunch for when I got closer to Maine, 5 minutes in Kinney's grabbing MORE last-minute stuff (3 of which were spent talking to Dorothy about 3 kids that died in a car crash in our town the night before,) 1.5 minutes on the phone to let Mitchell know I'm FINALLY leaving, and 2 minutes to drive out of the parking lot and to leave Lyndonville. I'm off!



[Insert 3.5 hours of uneventful driving here with an awesome soundtrack including songs such as: According to You-Orianthi, Follow Me-3OH3!, OMG-Usher, Shots-Lil Jon, LoveGame-Lady Gaga, Just Dance-Lady Gaga, TiK ToK-Ke$ha, Blah Blah Blah-Ke$ha, Defying Gravity, Don't Stop Believing, Imagine, It's My Life/Confessions, Smile (Lily Allen), Taking Chances, 4 Minutes-All from Glee, Jumpin' Jumpin'-Destiny's Child, Say My Name-Destiny's Child, Affirmation-Savage Garden, No Scrubs-TLC.]



"278, 276, 274...oh, come on! It's gotta be here somewhere! 258, 256....oh...crap. FML!" This was my internal dialogue while trying to find Mitch's house after finally finding his road. (There are like 3 roads that are actually one, but the name changes the further along the road you get. Kind of like Newark Rd/St...whatever. LOL.) Of course, I missed it the first time by, but then I had to find a place to pull over (5 minutes down the road) to call my gram to let her know I got to Maine safely, as promised. I felt like if I pulled into Mitch's driveway and then proceeded to sit in the car on my cellphone that that may come across as sketchy and stalkerish. Not the best way to come across when first visiting someone's home. Haha.



Anywho, I turned around after I got off the phone, and drove by it-again. WTF?! Why am I SO good at finding people's houses? FINALLY I pulled in the driveway. Phew.



Now, here's where more confusion begins. There's a front door, and a door through the garage into the house. Way to make it easy for me, Mitchell. The walkway to the front door looked promising, so I decided to try that first. No response. Awesome. Way to make an ass out of myself before even getting inside. "Well, this is awkward," I muttered as I turned away to go try the garage door next. Too late. Just as I finished talking out loud to myself and turned around, there he was at the end of the walkway. Fabulous, now he probably thinks I am a mental case as well. Just wondeful. :)



BUT-now I'm not the one that appears sketchy and stalkerish. He just stood at the end of the walkway and stared at me until I figured out the other door would be a better way to get into the house. Hahaha. Nice.



Going into the garage was fun. I got to meet Winston (the Pug,) and Jacob (the auburn Golden Retriever) tied up just outside. SOOO CUTE! Inside the house was pretty fun too. It was designed to draw people to the living room/kitchen area which I found very clever. I met Lily (KITTYYYY!!!!) in the living room, and got to see the rest of the house. It was gorgeous, and spotless like Mitchell had told me before- despite 3 pets living there.



I got shown his bedroom and the computer room-the two most frequented-by-Mitchell rooms in the house (except the computer room is more so.) The Guest Bedroom (Mitchell's room) was really very sparce. Of course, it kind of has to be, incase everything falls apart some night and he's out a place to live. His bed was really squishy and comfy-and big! People that have bigger-than-a-twin-sized bed facinate me. I've slept in a twin my entire life-which doesn't really provide or promote cuddling opportunities. :(



Oh! Then I got to see an album full of pictures of Mitchell growing up and excelling in school. Mitch=adorable child. (And is now a perfect man <3). I may have to look at this album again later when I'm sitting down and am really able to focus in and study it. All in all though, I loved it.



After seeing this and two of his PUBLISHED POEMS (that's right, my man is totally awesome,) we were a little at a loss for what to do next. Mitchell showed me a few things online (including a game called Plants v. Zombies.) My mom would love it. Eventually we decided to drive to the beach.



For some reason, Mitch decided that he liked watching me drive, then teased me about how cautious a driver I was. Hey! I actually learned to, you know, STOP at stop signs in Driver's Ed, apparently unlike you crazy Maine people. Haha!



We got to drive through downtown Portland-except I didn't really know what I was doing because some lanes aren't really marked well. We made it unscathed, even if some drivers were probably like, "Stupid Out-of-Stater." LMFAO. Also, there was a sketchy homeless man that we had to avoid, so that was fun, too. Haha.



BEEEAAAACCCCHHH!!!!!!!!!!!



The ocean was beautiful. There wasn't spectacular visiblility, but the sun was out and the breeze was relatively warm (and so was Mitchell.) :)



We walked along the beach, and playfully shoved each other. We talked, we cuddled, we sat, we cuddled some more, we became a couple, we bonded. It was really fabulous. Oh yeah, we kissed too. [Insert pre-teen squealing here.] I missed being intimate with someone more than I realized. Apparently I have soft lips? I mean, I thought lips were supposed to be soft all on their own? Maybe not. If not, I guess I'm lucky. He is too. :) (For those of you who are like me and sometimes need extra prompting, that was me saying that Mitchell has soft lips, too.)



On the way back to his house, we took the highway which bypassed Portland's heavy traffic.



Maine is such an interesting state. The majority of it looks like VT, but on the trip down to the ocean, there was a section that reminded me of Burlington, a section that reminded me of the hills in San Francisco (although I've never actually been there,) and downtown Portland that reminded me of Montreal. WTF?! I mean, it's cool. But just not what I'm used to. =)



Getting back to the house after stopping to grab cheap gas at Sam's Club (whooo hoooo!!!) we only had a few minutes before his mom came home from work.



After a few minutes of mindless banter back and forth when she finally got home, Mitchell decided to make us scarce until she decompressed from work. So, we decided to go lay down for an hour. YAY! CUDDLE TIME! We just layed in each other's arms and chatted back and forth for a while until Mitchell fell asleep. He's so comfy! Mitchell now =s Megan's new favorite body pillow. =)



About an hour later, we were up. After more wonderful kissing, we went into the computer room so I could watch him play an expert game of League of Legends (abbreviated to LoL) so I could learn something. Well, I don't know how much I learned, but maybe with time and experience it will all come to me.



Mitchell's mom ended up getting a little testy because the one game went longer than originally intended, and supper was ready. So, begrudgingly he left the game, and we went to grab supper. Chicken Alfredo. YESSS!!! We joined his mom and stepdad on the screened-in back porch, and made more small talk. Dinner overall went very well. I had a hard time eating due to my untimely wisdom tooth trying to shoulder its way into my mouth, but I just took my time and ate until I was full. Overall, dinner=success.



Soon after this, Mitchell decided to go grab gas for his car at Sam's Club, so I went with. If you think MY driving is interesting, you should check HIS out. Psh. LMFAO! It's okay though, it makes for an interesting ride.



When we returned "home", I unfortunatley had to get going. It was about 7:30 at night, and I needed to be able to read my directions. After a few kisses, nuzzles, and hugs, I left. :'( (There really wasn't any crying, but it was very sad.)



Leaving is always the hardest part. Getting there is so easy because you have all this time ahead of you to do whatever you want. Next thing you know, it's time to go. When you leave, everything is uncertain. You don't know when you'll see each other next, you don't want to let the person go even though you HAVE to, and you don't want to put miles and miles of distance between the two of you. It's just sucky all around.



On the way home, I got lost by missing a turn somewhere, and ended up near Oxford, ME. Eventually I just decided to follow routes heading West and North which is where I needed to go to get home. I don't think I acutally lost much time by getting lost. Once I found Conway, NH again, I definitely knew where I was and then booked it home.



All in all? Not a bad day, not a bad day at all. Mitchell makes me very happy, and he's good TO me and FOR me. We're both in this relationship for the long haul, so who knows where we'll end up. For now, I'm just along for the ride. And as long as there are no other cars at an intersection, who really needs to stop? <3

Classes, Housing, and Chargers, OH BOY!

Hello everyone!

Welcome back to my blog.  :)  This week has been an intensive, exhasuting one, and I can't wait for things to finally be wrapping up.

I had my last seminar class this morning.  I also found out that I don't have to attend the final exam slot set out for seminar because our final evaluation takes place at our final site visits by our field liasons.  Whooo, yeah!!! That means that one class is fully wrapped up.

As for other stuff, I have only 1 remaining 12 PAGE PAPER left to write, and then my stress for this semester will be over.

Housing selection went really well!  Ashley and I are going to be in our same room again next year here in 308.  We don't know if we have a 3rd roommate yet, or who she might be, but we are hoping she will be nice!  The girls who will be living in the double with us next year were kind of stalking us outside the building, looking for a way in to see what the dorm looks like.  The fact that they were stalking us already demonstrates that they are going to fit in perfectly with us.  This is going to be the start of a beautiful friendship!  Ryan lucked out in being able to live in a CASTLE next year.  Granted, it's on the 5th FLOOR, but at least he has his single.  He's happy. :)  (And half of his dresser/closet are going to me, soo....) yeah...

I have all the classes I want for next semester!  Here's what I'm taking: East Meets West (one of my COR classes about E & W Medicine, Chinese Journeys, Social Injustice in a Diverse Society, Social Welfare, Statistics, and Research Methods I.  Whooot! 

Basically, next semester is going to be AWESOME.  Hopefully I am awarded work-study, and hopefully I am able to pay my bills with just the one job...but we'll see.  :)  I can't wait to start fresh with all of my favorite people. 

In terms of my computer charger, my new one came in today!  Whoooo!!!!  I was able to bring Daphne's back to her, and now things are back to normal and as they should be.

The return of GLEE was fabulous on Tuesday, and I can't wait to see what sort of drama unfolds for this next installment. :D  Very exciting stuff!

Ok, well it is 2:40 am on Saturday morning, I suppose I should get on with my life.

Te amo everyone!
-Megan

Bloggable Moments

This weekend has been CRAZY....and it isn't over yet!  Starting Friday night, I had a PA Appreciation Dinner from 6-8.  Meg (from Career Services!) came with me to support Chelsea and I for all of our hard work in evaluating resumes and such.  Awww. <3 (We love Meg.)  Anywho, I was only planning on going and staying until about 7 because I wanted to be with my 308 girls (and Ryan!) and kick off the weekend on a good note. 

Well, slight change of plans.  The dinner was one of those that was a paced 3-course meal plus dessert, with different speakers from our group standing up to appreciate us, an all-inclusive slideshow, and superlatives. Yes, we're just THAT cool....we got superlatives.  I was choosen for "Sweetest PA" which is really cute.  :)

After being able to escape at 8, I got back to the dorm.  Previously during the day, there had been some discussion about Velvet wanting to go to the hospital per her mom's orders, so Meg had offered us a ride if need be.  I never got a response as to whether or not the ride was actually needed, so after having received a post on FaceBook that she may want to forego the trip, I thanked Meg but told her the ride probably wouldn't be necessary.  Once back at the dorm, 308 hung out for a few hours, and by 10pm guess what happened?  Yup, Velvet decided she wanted to go to the hospital.  SO, we walked up to Fletcher Allen Hospital at 10:30 pm, and had a grand old time.  Velvet was able to go back as soon as we got in the door essentially, and so Ashley, Ryan and I moved on into the waiting room until Velvet got out.  In the meantime, a "felon" was walked into the hospital and admitted to the Triage.  (We don't actually know what he did wrong, but this was the name Ryan dubbed him with.)  Felon was in cuffs accompanied by a Po-po man, and once admitted to the Triage, we were able to see what happened (unfortunately.)  Fortuantely for me though, I went to the bathroom as this next part unfolded.  Mr. Felon man got an IV stuck in him (which was able to be viewed by everybody in the waiting room because the Triage has windows....wtf.)  So Ryan and Ashley watched this drama unfold.

***NOTE-If you are eating, please finish before going on to read this next paragraph.***

In between watching Ashley and Ryan hold an EPIC game of UNO in Ryan's lap, another poor soul found its way to Fletcher Allen.  This guy was coughing up lung-fulls of phlegm/blood.  Unforunatley, because it was "after hours", only one of the Triage rooms was open...the one Mr. Felon man was occupying.  So basically while this guy was dying in the waiting room, Mr. Felon man was taking his time.  And to top it all off, when he got out of the Triage room to let the other guy in, Mr. Felon man was smiling and thinking this was all a grand old time.  Yeah....awesome.

FINALLY Velvet gets about about 1.5 hrs after we originally got there, and after basically only telling her what she already knew (except for clarifiying that it isn't a sprain, simply really inflamed for whatever reason,) we were able to go back for the evening.

Yesterday we spent time on homework/papers/final project-papers.  Not fun.  My 8 pager due Tuesday isn't even started yet because I'm still sifting through all my sources for information.  *Sigh*  After spending until about 3:30-4 on this, I was finished with a UVM book so I went with Ryan to go return it and to go grab supper.  Afterwards, we decided to go on a walk.  We discovered where the Intervale is located, and found some pretty epic hills that we didn't know existed.  All in all, it was a good time!

Today I'm planning on finishing up sifting through all my sources, and then getting a few good pages done by 5 pm at the latest tonight.  I REALLY want to get this paper on the roll, but it's hard because its for a professor who prides himself on being a hardass (his words, not mine.)  SO, this paper may or may not be the end of me.  I guess either way it works out.  For the rest of this semester, I have a study guide to complete for Fred, a project to complete for Fred, a 12 page paper for my Constituation Project, 2 oral presentations, a Written Process Recording to complete for Seminar, work on a Final Evaltuation for Seminar/my internship, 3 Music Makers concerts, Housing Selection Night, and a final Champlain Loses It Finale Party.  So, if the Ethnographic paper kills me, guess I won't have to worry about the rest of that! :)  Hahaha That's morbid... 

Ok blogosphere, just wanted to let you know I was still alive.  I'll post a picture and sign off for another week or two depending on how well I can survive the next 3 weeks.  Much love to you all!!!

-Megan

You HAVE to See This!

....just sayin.


Ok, so on to real business, my life = AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH right now.  My internship isn't all that bad today seeing as how I have something to do (yay!) but still...I'm just about ready to be done.

I'm preparing to get in to take a CCV course this summer, and I've filled out the online application...so now I'm just waiting to hear back either via e-mail or letter to my home mailbox, and take the next steps.  I've requested a copy of my transcript, so I'm well on my way to navigating ANOTHER college system.

Next week I have a couple of recognition dinners coming up.  The first is an EHS Division Honors night.  Velvet, Ryan, and Ashley are going to accompany me for the evening for the dinner and recognition (I guess I got in because of my GPA or something, but I'm not really sure.  I feel like I should have been acknowledged for this last year as well if that is the case,) and overall I think it will be fun.  It's free food....and not caf-related (I don't think.)  What more could you want?!

The second is PA recognition night.  This unfortunately I have to go to by myself, but it's supposed to be "fun", and "themed"...and that makes me not want to go already.  I'm just really done with being a PA, but again..it's free food....and NOT caf related.  WHOOO HOOO!

This weekend, although the weather is supposed to be in the 70s and GORGEOUS...I'll give you THREE guesses where I'll be...and the first one doesn't count.  North Beach?  Yeah right.  Try again.  C'mon...you can figure this out!  THERE you go...fianlly.  Yep...that's right, the library.  How depressing is that?!  I mean, I have this 25+ source bibliography due a week from today, and I'm kind of freaking out.  Mostly because I'm not sure I have time to get it done, but secondly, I don't really have the motivation to do so either.  I hate my COR classes this year.  Most of the students in my class aren't all that bad, but with as much as I have on my plate this semester, the two COR professors I have are asking wayyy too much of me.  Any other semester I wouldn't have had as huge a problem with it, but I literally don't have time to sit down and do all the $hit they want me to (of course I say this as I'm spending 15 mins on a blog...) I'M VENTING, OK?! JEEZ!

This past weekend was fun because I got to go sit on a panel of students at Accepted Students Day on Saturday to represent the SWK program and where I came from, why I chose SWK, that sort of thing.  Velvet continued with her strange habit of stalking me, and we both together continued our strange (actually, completely normal) habit of stalking another Megan we know.  She is in Music Makers with us, sits next to me, and has our same sense of humor.  In short, we love her.  And we now see her all over campus....like, whether we want to or not.  SO, that's been fun!

Looking forward to this weekend (again), my family said that they would like for me to come home...which would be amazing.  Except remember that whole 25 source bibliography I have to do?  And the 77-or-so degeree weather + sun?  Yeah....uhm....not sure going home is going to be an option.  Sunday though, they will be coming up to take me out for an Easter lunch/dinner, so that will be great.  (Again, not caf food!)

Looking ahead two weeks, #1) GLEE RETURNS, #2) Champlain Loses It has its finale party (which somehow Ashley Velvet and I are still in,) #3) We have two Music Makers concerts-one for a fundraiser, another for a Diversity and Inclusion dinner (maybe not caf food?), #4) Accepted Students Day-which I may get to go represent for SWK again, and even further, #5) the Music Maker's own concert on April 20th, 7pm, in the Auditorium.  WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT!!!  It's been another great semester for Music Makers, so this will be exciting. 

I forgot to mention!  Zumba is amazing.  I looked into taking some classes this summer back in my area, but it's $45 for 6 classes.  Not sure I want to pay for that.  Actually, that's kind of riddiculous.  Maybe if there's a class in Montpelier on Mondays/Wednesdays that's cheaper I can hang around after my summer class to do that too!  We shall see.  I've finally found a fitness program that I actually love, and I guess it's too soon to tell whether or not I can continue with it this summer.  If not, I'll have to try to make it work in my schedule for next semeseter.

All in all....I have a crap load of work coming up all due within the next 3-4 weeks.  I've worked hard for some of this stuff, and so now balancing the rewards (AKA recognition dinners) around all the hard work I still have left to do is going to be an interesting dance.  We'll see how that all goes.

Class and housing registrations have been taking a toll on everyone as well.  Planning a schedule that you can live with is difficult!  Like, it's almost a life and death situation..but not.  Most students try to get a Friday or a Monday off so that they can relax, sleep, whatever on the 3 day weekend.  The rest of us are just hoping classes we need to take don't fill up before our registration window opens and we're able to get into the classes we want.

Housing selection is going to take a toll on a lot of us too.  Ashley and I would like to try to get our same triple again, so we're waiting for priority numbers to come out in order to see what sort of chance we have of making that happen again.  We love our couch (it's a place for Ryan to stay when he comes to visit,) Ashley loves her chair, and we just want our room back.  Velvet is going thru some $hit about just trying to make sure she can come back next year, so we're all hoping for the best.  It would be fantastic if she was able to be our 3rd roommate, but we don't know what's happening just yet.  Everyone just hope for the best.  There's got to be a light at the end of the tunnel somewhere.  RAWR!

I believe that this is the end of everything I can think of for the rest of the semester.  I apologize for all the paragraphs being so choppy, and for the lack of transitions.  Stream of conciousness writing will do that to you. :)

Hope you all have a fantastic day!

-Megan

I Love Being 9 Years Old

This weekend I went home with Ryan for a mini-slumber party at my house.  Already, you can tell this is going to be an excellent weekend.

My grandmother calls me Friday morning wanting to know if I want to get picked up that night.  I decline, but tell her that both Ryan and I would be willing to come home Saturday morning to spend a night at my house.

After a sort-of-restful night at Jeanne Mance, Ryan and I wake up looking for breakfast.  Brennan's is closed, Cooks just...ugh, and everything else just kind of failed.  Oh well, it worked out (kind of) because we got to go to Friendly's!  (Note about that: waitress fail, breakfast..eh..so-so.) 

After getting back to my house, Ryan books it for my shower.  Apparently it has some appeal.  Awesome!  I find nail clippers to take care of my nails that were bothering me all Friday night, and THEN we're all good to go.

Alice in Wonderland was playing at the Star Theatre, so we went to see that.  TIM BURTON + JOHNNY DEPP DO IT AGAIN!!!!  It was amazing!  After this, we run back to my house for a quick pb + pickle sandwich lunch, and run back out the door with a frisbee and camera to go play.  I decided that we should go to the East Burke Playground, and then Ryan and I got to act like we were 9 yr olds (promptly showing the ACTUAL 9 yr olds already there how its done.)

Note to the world: Megan's frisbee aim SUCKS.  Hahahaha.  If your life depends on my frisbee aim...FYI, you're DOOMED!!!!

After two hours of epic awesomeness (and a 10 minute hike,) we decide that its time to go see Eleemosynary at LI.  That, too was EPIC.  AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.  Everything was just so good.  :D

At around 8:30-9pm, we leave LI and decide that we're starving.  I already know there is going to be nothing spectacular to eat at home, so a ROADTRIP TO PRICE CHOPPER happens!  Originally we were looking to just buy a pre-cooked chicken and dissect that, but epicFAILPriceChopper.  So, to improvise, we buy Pizza Bread (amazing!), ABC shaped tater-tots, and Pillsbury SuperDuper Chocolate Chip cookies (or something of the sort.)  This constitutes another win for team Meg Ryan.  (See, when we live together, we're not going to starve!  Between the two of us we can manage to operate a microwave, an oven, and pour milk.)  :)  On the way out, Ryan and I decide to invest in 2 Redbox movies for the night.  Precious was in!!!!!!!!!!!  Also, we found that Couple's Retreat was in, and it looked halarious--so we thought we'd give that one a shot.  Both were pretty good.  Precious made us cry, and Couple's Retreat was just a great get-away-from-reality kind of movie.

After having exhausted ourselves for the day, we get ready for bed.  We get into bed at 2am, but don't go to bed until 4-4:30.  How does this happen?  Talking.  About what?  Past, present, future, babies, being single, being taken, jobs, UVMFail, ChamplainFail, UVMWIN, ChamplainWIN, friends (both old and new,) and about how we are just basically going to live together for the rest of our lives after college is all over with.  Neither one of us is planning on  getting a boyfriend or girlfriend because that means one of us is probably going to get jealous, and THEN we'll have an issue. (That'll screw up the whole 'both of us living together forever' situation.)  LOL! 

My family members are all working on getting life insurance, so in case one of them dies (KNOCK ON WOOD!) the house will be paid for.  In my grandfather's words "...because we don't know anybody that's interested in living here." (That's sarcastic...and "anybody" means me.)  I do want to live in that house after college if my job allows me to, so we'll see how this all works out!

Anywho, that was about the extent of my Saturday adventures! 

Hope you all had a safe weekend!

Much love!
-Megan

Anticipation and Anxt

What a week.  Can it be Friday night at like, 5 pm right now?

Velvet, Ashley, Joe and I are all preparing for Ryan's birthday coming up on SATURDAY!!!!!! 

Velvet and I have some secret plans to implement and carry out for Friday night, and Joe is going to be dragged into some of it, even though he isn't aware of this yet.  :)  Ashley will be included in the plans too, although she isn't aware of either of them yet.

Ryan and I have decided that we can't go more than 12 hours without seeing each other now.  We keep finding excuses to get together even for a random span of 45 mins between our classes.  It's bad-but somehow, I'm really ok with that. :P  I need me some Ryan!

As for everything else, my internship is clunking along.  Hopefully it'll get easier after the meeting with our consultants today.  AHHHHHHH.  I have so many impending projects and papers due this week.  I had forgotten about the majority of them, but they're all do-able, I think. 

My iTunes is now officially the best compiled selection of music on my campus.  I LOVE my iTunes.  AHHHH!!!!!  Hahahaha.

Anywho...hope everyone else is survivng their semester!  I'm going to go work on hw and some internship items.

Love as always!
-Megan

...And I'm Back!!!

I apologize deeply for my leave of absence.  Things have indeed been intense here at 308 Maple.  (If you read Ryan's blog at http://www.ryhowland.blogspot.com/ you'll get some of the full story.)  Drama, miscommunications, alcohol-induced sickness, yeah, we've had the works.

Anywho, so I'm not sure if I've talked about this yet on my blog or not, but Ryan and I should basicly be related.  He's my twin.  We say the same thing, think the same thing, and tend to do the same thing at the exact same time or within minutes of each other.  For instance, my sneakers have been acting up with me since Halloween-ish.  The soles keep slipping up and around the back of my ankle while I'm trying to walk.  NOT fun.  So I had to go get new sneakers, which I accomplished yesterday.

Yesterday, Ryan's dad came up to have him go get the H1N1 Swine Flu Vaccination.  (Ick.)  And Ryan's sneakers are actually ripping apart.  Can you guess the rest of the story???  Yeah, he now has a brand new pair of converse sneakers that look AWESOME on him.  Seriously, he's hot.  Hahaha.  My baby brother is growing up!!! Awww.

Anywho, I am furious now that I have found out EASTWICK is being cancelled because ABC doesn't think the ratings have been good enough.  WTF.  I LIKE THAT SHOW.  STOP THAT!   ABC, you CAN'T just take something off the air when it has as complicated and interesting a plotline as Eastwick.  WTF?!!!?!?!

On a lighter note, Glee will be back on this Wednesday, so that's good.

My butt, thighs, abs and shoulders hurt.  Kickboxing 2 nights in a row (Thursday and Friday) is INTENSE.  I asked Luke if he maybe had punching pads at his house, because the origional plan was for me to go see him this weekend.  (More about the origional plan later.)  But he didn't...soooo I can't work on anything this weekend.  I really just want a partner to come with me to the gym to hold punching pads so i can keep working on that (my favorite part.)  Velvet would be the ideal person since she's about my height and stature, but she has to work. I TOES understand that.  So, yeah.  I'm kind of tempted to just ask a random guy in the gym to work with me.  I find I like punching things, it's an excellent stress reliever.  I'm not generally a violent person, but that kind of exercise makes me feel good.  Sometimes I like being my weight and height, it allows me to withstand more things than if I were 145.  :D

Back to the "origional plan" of this weekend.  I was supposed to go see Luke this weekend because we haven't been able to get together in a while.  However, my Great Aunt Janet passed away Friday night at midnight, and I really want to be at her funeral.  She was one of the few family members I got along with and liked outside of my immediate family, so I want to be there to say my goodbyes.  I'm worried about my grandfather.  I inherited a lot of things from him.  The tendency to bottle things up until the bottle explodes and shatters EVERYWHERE is one of them.  I really want to be home with him so I can talk with him and have him get some of his feelings out, but since I have class and work that won't work out too well.  :(  I have Janet as a friend on Facebook, and the last comment that had been posted on her wall was a "Happy Birthday" comment, because her b-day had come on Oct. 22nd of this year.  I added a fresh comment of (mind you this is paraphrasing), "RIP Aunt Janet, you will be dearly missed.  I'll help take care of your baby brother, no worries."  It's hard to imagine that she's really gone.  If you wanted to have some excellent food, you just went to Janet.  She had the BEST baking skills I've ever seen, and that woman knew how to whip up a meal for people.  I hope that she's happy, wherever she has moved on to.

And on my grandmother's side, her brother is in the hospital.  He's having a hard time breathing on his own and getting oxygen into his system, and he's a very sick man all around.  Darthmouth is doing what they can to care for him, but nobody knows how well this is all going to work out.  He doesn't have Swine Flu, but because he has black mold all over the trailer he lives in (that he's been breathing in for years), nobody is too sure how this is going to come out in the end. 

Life is full of unexpected surprises.  The best you can do is to just try to roll with the punches.  People you love could be gone in an instant.  Make sure the last time you talk to someone isn't a talk full of anger and hate.  Nobody wants to part with dischord, especially with someone you love.  Look out for one another, take care of one another, and make sure you have some sort of support system to help get you through things like this.  No one should have to go through a death alone.  Be a team, do it together.

With that, I will go.  I'm a little hungry and I want to do an hour at the gym before I eat real food.  Hahaha. 

x.o.x.o.
Love,
Megan

This Weekend...was Awesome.

Where do I start in telling you about this weekend????  My goodness!  Well, first off, I took Ashley home with me for Friday night.  We ended up driving around St. J, Lyndonville, stopping @ P-chops for food & a Redbox movie, going to Cumby's for more food, and staying up till 3-3:30 am reading all the magazines that had come in the mail for me as well as trying to watch The Shortcut. 

We had planned to go to the big St. J/LI Football Game (the 105th one mind you), and actually that didn't happen.  But LI won 14-0!!!!!  Kind of a little bit of domination there. :) 

Then, after scrambling back to Burlington, we got ready for HALLOWEEN.  What a blast!  After Ryan and I put on all our makeup, we made a pretty kick-ass Sweeney Todd and Ms. Lovett.

Why is Ryan's hair SO not awesome?  :)  Love it!  We had fun trying to get Joe's hair to do the same thing essentially.  Good times. :)

So, after our failed attempt at Trick-or-Treating (no one wants to give candy to college students....what's with that?)  we dropped everything back off at the dorm.  We are people just like anyone else, are we not?  We deserve a night to get candy that we don't have to pay for seeing as how we're more broke than you most of the time.  Psh. Whatev.

Anywho, after that, we decided to go walk around Church St. & City Park to take pictures.

And then other than the drunk people asking "Where the F#@! is my F*$R&#g Pirate Cup?" and Ashley totally dominating one conversation with random people, it was pretty uneventful.

We ended up walking to Winooski, and decided to walk down under the bridge.

Yes, it was a good time.  After all this, we walked back to Ryan & Joe's dorm (after me sprinting for about 3 minutes straight because Joe somehow walked really fast and got really far ahead of us without realizing it,) we took a pee-break, and came back to my dorm for the night. 

We ordered Wings, I stared and couldn't breathe after eating, then we went to bed. 

I LOVE my friends so much!  In conclusion, this weekend was AWESOME.  One of the best I've had I think!  It was my first spent with Ryan, my first spent "out on the town" with friends, not being followed around my family.  Pretty exciting stuff!

Lots of Love,

Megan