8.29.2006

One Door Closes...

And another one opens. Life is full of surprises- great surprises and the kind of surprises that just make you think "What in the hell is going on?"

Things might have changed in the past few days, but that's what happens. If you're like me, you hate when people talk in subtleties and don't really say what they want to say. I don't feel like discussing specifics, lest the people who I'm talking about realize I'm talking about them.

Anyway- classes started yesterday. All 4 classes on both Mondays & Wednesdays (ECE 345: Electronic Controls, ME 371: Mechanical Design I, ME 361: Dynamics, & ME 391: Advanced Engineering Math), and absolutely nothing on Tuesdays. Hopefully I take advantage of that day off to do absolutely nothing. Thursday I'll have my ECE lab, but that doesn't start for two more weeks. And then I finish the week out with 371 & 361. Not too bad so far, and it'd be great if it stayed that way.

I really don't have much else to say, I'm just going to get through the rest of this week and then enjoy the weekend as much as I can.

8.27.2006

Just One of Those Weekends

It has definitely been a strange past few days, but strange in the good way the more I think about it. I moved up to East Lansing this past Wednesday, and I was glad to finally be here.

Thursday night I went out to P.T.'s and met up with a few friends, made some new ones, and even managed to run into a couple old ones- my ex included.

I thought it would be awkward at first, but we ended up hanging out Friday night and some of Saturday night. We just talked about everything, from family to friends to life in general, and that was nice. It's not very often that you can still stay friends with someone you were so close to, so I appreciated it.

Life is moving along fairly briskly. The girl I've been crazy about this whole summer went back to Italy, and the fact that I didn't get a chance to visit her before she left had me doing a lot of dwelling, which is never good. School starts tomorrow; it'll be the first time in 8 months that I'll be sitting in a class again, and I don't know what to think. I could barely sit still for an entire period before, so I'm going to give myself 25 minutes before I walk out of class to take a break. Hopefully that's not the case.

I'm looking forward to having a productive and fun fall semester, and there's no reason I won't. Have a good week.

8.24.2006

I Hate Nail Polish Remover

And no, I wasn't using it to take off the Barbie California Sunset Red polish on my toes. What I was actually doing was attempting to remove some stickers from my windshield. I put the uncapped bottle on the roof of the car, thinking it would stay put. Of course not- the wind blew the bottle over, and in a very feeble attempt to catch the bottle, I slapped it, and out came all the liquid.

Long story short, I went blind for close to 15 minutes. My eyes have never burned so badly, and all I could think of was, "Wow, I'm going to be blind and the last thing I saw was my car door." Pathetic.

Everything's alright now, and I couldn't be happier to have my sight. There's so many things I still need to see and experience, and to lose such an important sense would be terrible. I definitely won't be taking it for granted any more.

I'm finally up at MSU for good. I don't know why I was looking forward to it so much, things haven't really changed here in the 8 months I've been gone. Class starts Monday, so I'll enjoy the next few days as much as I can and then hit the books. Hard.

8.20.2006

Too Much But Not Enough

My room is a mess. There's DVDs, different cables, clothes, and electronics everywhere, and instead of cleaning them all up, I'm sitting here because there's too much going through my mind to just suppress.

I went to the John Fogerty/Willie Nelson concert at DTE this past Friday night. We were a little late and missed quite a bit of Willie's opening act, which seemed pretty short anyway. Jen was more than disappointed, and I felt bad- she's a big Willie Nelson fan.

Fogerty didn't disappoint- sure his set was just shy of two hours long, which was pretty short compared to his other tour stops, but I'm not complaining. He pulled out all the hits and rocked them all; it's amazing how true his vocals have stayed over time. Overall, not too bad a show, could've been better.

Josh and I went up to MSU and crashed at the apartment last night. We had our cable installed, which was a pretty exciting time, considering the new tv and the HD and such. Besides that, we pretty much just hung around the place. EL hasn't changed too much, not that I expected it to.

I was supposed to be staying in EL until school started, but work beckoned, and I could always use a little more cash. It's not like I was going to be doing anything or hanging out with anyone (God forbid anyone call), so I might as well spend a couple more days in this hellhole of a town/house and get out of here a little later. Have a good week.

8.15.2006

Staying Busy Again

Obviously, I mean, it's Tuesday and this is the first chance I have to talk about my weekend.

We (meaning the family) took a trip to the Toronto area this past weekend. And don't think we did anything fun and cool, it was mostly just family time. My cousin moved to Canada from India a little while ago, and his wife and two kids came along a little while after him. After spending two nights at his place, I now I have a newfound appreciation for what my parents went through when they first came to this country.

Some pics from the trip:










All in all, Toronto was fun, customs was not a hassle at all (here's a hint: take the tunnel, not the Blue Water Bridge), and we all got back in one piece.

8.07.2006

2 Weeks

2 more weeks until I move back to MSU. 2 more weeks until I can finally say my summer is over. Not that it's been terrible or anything, I'm just ready to move on and get the school thing started with.

These past couple of weeks have been pretty normal, more or less. More relaxing, more hanging out, more pointless errands, more family parties.

So instead of just shooting off more inane BS that no one reading this really cares for, I'm just gonna throw out some personal topics and discuss what the hell I'm thinking about...

School: Oh Jesus Christ, we start August 28th, and I am nowhere near ready. I haven't been in a classroom since last December, and just the thought of cracking open a book and studying gives me the shakes. But at the same time, I know what I need to do, I know the grades I need to get, and I'm more motivated than ever before to do well.

Work: Short term? I'm going back to my aunt's to work for the next couple of weeks, basically just to pay off my TV and make some gas money. Hopefully it's nothing hard, because my brain has been on autopilot for the past 6 weeks. Long term? I'll be going back to Toyota in May, but I'm not sure where. I could get assigned to Georgetown again, or Indiana, San Antonio, or one of the Ontario plants. I wouldn't mind going to Kentucky again, but Texas would be pretty nice too. Hopefully Toyota offers me a position after I graduate, because I would love living in Kentucky.

Money: I feel I'm in a pretty good financial state at 21 years old. I could always be better, but right now, I'm happy. There's money in the bank, I've got the stuff I want/need. At the same time, I do realize that I need to control or keep track of my spending, because there are times when it can get out of hand (picking up the tab all the time, buying useless stuff, etc)

Girls: haha, oh man, fuck it. I know I'm a good guy, and I've got a lot going for me. If something happens, hey, that's great, but if not, I'm not going to punch myself in the face and cry over it. I'm young, and right now time is on my side. Of course there's a girl I care a lot about right now, but there are just so many circumstances surrounding our relationship that I have no idea what's going to happen. It's really out of my hands, I've said what I wanted to say, and that's all.

Friends: I'm lucky to have two really close, good friends. If I was given the choice of having 50 average friends or these 2 great ones, I'd take the 2 any day. Of course I have other friends, and I care about them too, but those ones will come and go- the two will stay through thick and thin. I'm always up for meeting new people and making new friends though, don't try and label me as some inconsiderate bastard who already has enough friends.

Family: Finally, family. Besides my 2 best friends, blood is the only real constant in life. I consider myself very lucky that my parents are in relatively good health, and that my brother, as much a prick as he may be, is healthy and has his whole life ahead of him. I've been fortunate enough to not have to experience tragic losses or events up close; I mean, my Dad's parents passed away when I was younger, and it really hurt me more to see my Dad crying. Since my grandparents lived in India, I only met them a handful of times, and all of those times were before I was even in middle school. Bottom line, I love every single one of my family members, and I would do anything for them. And that's a family that spans the country and a few different countries.


Good night and have a good week, stay positive.