So this semester, in many ways, is looking up. I'm liking pretty much all my classes, even Chinese (which, considering how HORRIBLE I am at foreign languages, is a surprise). I didn't get into the musical =( but I got into a straight play: The Furies, aka The Eumenidies, as a Fury, which is super exciting. =) KP has been pretty busy, having just finished competing in the ICCAs (we didn't place, but we still did really well and I'm so proud of us) and we have several gigs coming up, not to mention a birthday! =) I've been really busy and it's been fun.

On the other hand, it sucks. I'm maxed out at 18 units, plus the play. I'm in class until 6pm every day except Friday, going straight from 2-6 without a real break, plus classes in the morning. My Mondays in the future are going to look like this: class 11:30-1, class 2-3:30, class 4-6, rehearsal 6-10 and KP rehearsal 10-12. It's going to be insane. I may or may not actually study.

Of course, that leaves Friday and Saturday totally open. So I'm actually unsure how to use all this free time. It's a little strange. And everyone I know is busy all the time, so it's hard to coordinate things with them on those weekends. So I got from all-day busy Mon-Thursday to almost nothing on Friday and Saturday. Sundays we have KP rehearsal and some Furies rehearsals sometimes.

So it's a double edged sword.  Of course, I'm the kind of person who'd rather have it all spread out so I'm doing a little bit every day, instead of everything at once and then a few days to rest. But we'll see how the semester goes.

I've been bad with NaNoWriMo. For about a week I totally stopped writing. Thing is, I got stuck in a spot with my novel and I didn't know where to go. Lets face it, I've never written a mystery and suddenly I got scared about writing. It was too hard... so I stopped.

But then I realized that I wanted to finish this year. I gave up midway last year and I really didn't want to do that again. Not to mention that I really really want a proof copy of my novel, which rumor has it is one of the prizes for winning. And since I realized how boring and uninteresting a lot of my novel was, I now know there's about a 0% chance of publishing it, so I have no reason not to get the CreateSpace copy.

But I was only at 27k. Not great. but today.. I wrote over 5k. 5454, exactly, over the process of 2 20-minute sprints and 1 30 minute sprint against Write or Die, then a few extra filler words to make it over 35k. And though I'm barely over 35k, I'm still there!

So only a few more days left... but I think I'm going to do it! I'm SO close. I know I can make it, and now that I've scrapped the plot and now am writing about really strange and awkward characters in the same universe of my story, just taking place after the story ends, I'm free to write whatever pops into my brain.

Not the best way to go. But oh well. It's going to get done, I swear. I'll make sure, somehow. Considering it's Thanksgiving, it'll be tough... but I need to do this.

And lesson for next year? Really REALLY enjoy your story. Like it. Love it. Don't write something because it could be cool, because then you're stuck and have to start after the end. My NaNo is like the epilogue that doesn't go anywhere, and it's full of typos (and I hate typos--notice the moderately nice grammar and good spelling and proper capatilization in this post? Yeah. Exactly.) and I hate it, but you gotta do whatcha gotta do.

And on that note, off to write more and watch a TV show. And to everyone else... Have a Happy Thanksgiving!!!

I like lists. So here's a list of things that make me happy!

1) Last.fm. Such a great site for tracking your listening habits. Download the program (it's free, and it hasn't given me any problems, so I'd say it's pretty safe to download), and it'll track the songs and artists you listen to, then give you recommendations for other artists. I don't use the recommendations much, but I do love looking at my stats. I've listened to so much Lauren Kennedy, and I hadn't even realized! It's a great site.

2) 13 -  the new Broadway Musical. It's Jason Robert Brown, so automatically it's going to be pretty good, but this score is so much fun! It's quite poppy at parts, but I enjoy it. I'm obsessed with some of the songs, like Opportunity and It Can't Be True. And these songs are sung by 13 year olds! I never had this much talent as them when I was their age. It's amazing. If you like popular music or Broadway, definitely give it a try. It's a lot of fun.

3) My Alphasmart Neo. It's a great little gadget that lets you type anywhere - basically a portable word processor. And now that I've installed the correct drivers for my computer, it works perfectly. Even though since I downloaded it my printer has stopped working correctly... hmm... but whatever. It's a great thing to have. I love it. It's named Nemo. =)

4) Singing. I'm in an a cappella group at USC, and it's so much fun! When we're on, we're on. And we have our first performance with the new members this week! I'm excited. It's a small show, nothing noteworthy, but I have high hopes for our future as a group. (We've only been a group since February, so we've made strong strides this year. It's exciting.)

5) Meeting word count at NaNoWriMo. I haven't been writing every day, more like every other day, but since I always write more than 1667 (usually somewhere in the 2000 range) I haven't gotten too far behind. Yay. And after I wrote my daily word count, I went on the forums and got excited again. I'd be writing more now if I didn't have 4 pages of a draft of a paper due tomorrow. Maybe I should work on that..... hmm....

6) Cool new playlists in iTunes. =) Enough said. (Especially ones that have songs with amazing harmonies. I LOVE HARMONIES! (I'm also a music nut. Can you tell?))

7) Smiley faces. Because they're happy!!! Hehehehe.....

8) Q10. It's such a great program for Windows. It makes awesome typewriter noises when you type, it's full screen and I have a pink font color! It's cute. I love it.

9) My boyfriend. Because I love him. And he makes me happy!

10) New music. I just found a song from Shrek the Musical of their website (for free! Download it) and it's very cute. Plus it has Sutton Foster, who's absolutely amazing, so I like it a lot. I also just got Christina Aguilera's newest song, which I don't love but I don't hate either. And, of course, 13.

2 hours of a cappella singing rehearsal shouldn't be a big deal. I do it all the time, several times a week.
But tonight, singing so many high G-Bs, trying to control the vibrato and keep it soft so it balances with everyone else.... ahhhhhh!
Plus a round of high belting, which the highest notes (an F!!) I have only recently developed... and we sing it way sharp. Double ahh!!!!
(At least I can sing an F now. That's really exciting for me... I thought my belting range ended at E flat. But it's getting higher and higher! Hooray!! (now, granted, I can't sing that song more than 3 times in a row before my voice starts to give out... but still. It's exciting.))
So... no voice. But no need to talk for the rest of the night, so no biggie!

TiVo didn't record Privileged because of the Obama victory. Which is great, because I'm really happy he won... but also a bummer. I'd like to have seen the episode. I guess it's off to internet television methods to watch the show!

I've gotten a little off track with NaNoWriMo, but if I write a few extra words a day I'll be fine. I'm not worred. I can finish... I just need to get the willpower again to start. But I've been writing on and off during boring classes, so I think I'll be ok.

Homework time! Lets get this massive Philosphy exercise out of the way.

My printer and external hard drive have decided not to work properly today. I have no idea why. I feel like they've been acting up ever since I installed all my Alphasmart programs. It bugs me. I'll work on it later, but I wish they would function the way they were supposed to!

NaNoWriMo's going alright. I changed my story to a mystery, but it's going really slowly and I'm getting a little bored. I did write in a ridiculous character named Edna Mae today though, and I like her a lot. Stereotypical old lady with glasses and hard of hearing. She makes me laugh. Which is good.

I keep forgetting that I get cranky when I don't eat. So at 12AM, when I'm talking to Adam on the phone and getting whiny, I should remember to eat a snack. My late night snacks of choice lately have been apples. Yummy.

I'm pretty behind for my movement class: I need to be totally off book a monologue for Wednesday. I have the first half of the monologue half memorized, so nowhere near ready to rehearse. But whatever... that's what tomorrow's for. I just finished a plot paper on the play Tilt Angel (it's bizarre, and I'd like it much more if it weren't assigned for class!!), so now I get to go to sleep. Yaaaaaayyyyyy.......

Hope everyone votes today! (I'll be so ready for the elections to be over. I want to know who the next president is! And btw... that reminds me, I was interviewed for Channel 4's news broadcast today! I talked a bit about being a college aged citizen and how I thought the younger demographic would effect the election. They used a tiny snippet of it--not much, but I was happy just to be on TV. I figured they interviewed a bunch a people and they wouldn't include me. They wrote out my name and everything! It's pretty cool. =D)

Goodnight all!!

how am i going to have any success after college if i keep failing IN college?
nothing. i can't succeed in anything.
this is ridiculous.
i'm just tired of everything.

I got a new Blackberry Curve over the weekend. Charged it fully on Saturday and now it’s already at 55%. Similar amount of battery time as my last teeny-weeny phone, I suppose, and it’s a way more technologically advanced phone, so it’s not bad, I suppose. But I want a better battery! I want it to last a full week without needing to charge it. Oh well... I suppose we can’t have everything we want in life. It’s the price we pay for awesome new cell phones! Of course, now that I have a super-texty phone, I want more people to text me! I was at home and my sister was texting all the time. It was ridiculous! Drove me nuts. I don’t want to be like that, but I want more people to text me. Hehehe... well, I guess I can just text her anytime I want a long crazy conversation. And regardless of the texting, it’s an awesome phone. I love it. Not as small as my mini-Pantech, but I put in my whole calendar and it looks so cool on the not-so-little screen! I love love love it!

 

On another note, I turned in a super-rough draft of my latest Writing 140 paper. It totally sucks... but then I went in and talked to my writing professor and she says it’s good for a rough draft. It’s about cloning and the pros/cons of cloning. I’m arguing that therapeutic cloning is good, and maybe reproductive cloning IF it can save lives without harming others. It’s turning into more of a philosophical/morality paper than a research paper, but I like that. It makes it a little more interesting. I’m still considering minoring/double majoring in philosophy. It’s one of the easiest majors to major in, units-wise (only 8 classes. You could do that in a year!), and I actually find it interesting. I don’t love my political philosophy class right now though, because I find politics a little dull. But for regular philosophy, I find it interesting.

A) Acting performance and project got moved to next Tuesday. Hooray! An extra week to work on it.

B) Still not sure about NaNoWriMo. I think I've figured out a way to incorporate a bunch of sub-plots, so that it's not really about the girl on the bench, but about the people who pass her and see her daily. I feel like it's going to get a teeny bit philosophical. (Considering I'm in a philosophy class now, it's not surprising.) But then I want to write a teeny-bopper love story too... Well, maybe it'll be a giant combination of stories, so when I get bored with one I do another. It's going to be interesting. Let's see how this goes...

C) Spent 3:30-8:30 homeworking. Usually I can't sit down and just focus, but after class I just went and did a lot of reading, then worked on my paper due Friday in the library. Speaking of the library...

D) I discovered a bunch of new things about Leavey today. There's 2 floors of computers! And a periodical room! And a decent section of just plays! (Especially when compared to the library at home. That one sucks. This one's not half bad.) Can't believe it's my second year here and I'm just discovering new things.

E) Privileged=adorable. I love that show. It's not doing super well, as far as I can tell, but I haven't read a TV-blog that hasn't liked it a lot. And don't tell me if you know of any... I love the show. It's so cute! But I can't stand the title sequence. It's super-short, but no one can type like that! Drives me nuts everytime...

It's time to start thinking about Nanowrimo again! LOL that's all I ever use this blog for, I swear.

So I have an idea, but I'm not sure if it's good enough for Nanowrimo. And when I say good, I mean meaty enough. I have an idea in my head - a really really rough sketch, but it's definitely a passive kind of story. As in, the main character doesn't do anything. Literally. She sits on a park bench and observes the world. People try to interact with her, but she doesn't really respond, and people just go along with their own lives. Nothing happens. The ironic part? The title: The Story of a Girl. It's not really about her... but it is. And maybe, eventually, she'll start interacting with the environment. Something will catch her interest enough to get her to talk, and maybe she'll communicate somehow.

So like I sad, a rough rough sketch. Can I really babble on and on for 50k words about a girl who doesn't do anything? I could see this having great dares - imagine the things she observes! But I also want this to be a serious piece, and that might be too tough for this November. Especially since I didn't win last year. =( But my other idea is too silly and flighty. I want to write something a litle darker, with genuinely developed characters. Yes, a genuine piece for Nanowrimo - it's impossible! But we'll see. Hey, I reread some stuff I wrote last year and parts of it were pretty good. So... we'll see.

In other news, I have an acting assignment that makes no sense to me.  I know, I know, it seems impossible. Acting assignments on the outside are usually easy, but once you develop the work it's hard. Not for this. It's a super open-ended assignment and so I'm not sure exactly what to do. Plus it's supposed to be performed on Thursday. I bet I'll be having a couple late-nighters the next few nights. Not all nighters though - I can't do those. I think I need a minimum of 8 hours of sleep to function without yawning all day. Luckily my first class isn't until 11AM tomorrow, so I'm good on that front!!

I'm panicking.
Over something that isn't even that big a deal.
Since it probably won't really end up happening.
Ahhhhh the life of the auditioners.
But I dunno....
It's just stressing me out.

1) Look at the list and bold those you have read.
2) Italicize those you started but did not finish.
3) Underline the books you LOVE.
4) Reprint this list in your own LJ so we can try and track down these people who've read 6 and force books upon them

1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 The Bible
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D'Urbervilles
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare most of them but not the entire body of work
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveller's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones's Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte's Web - EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

33/100... not bad!! Amazing how many of these were assigned for school. I guess English classes did a good job assigning us which books to read.

I have a final tomorrow which I'm kind of in trouble for. I kind of didn't study... at all.... ohhhh boy.
So what am I doing now? Going for a b-day party! Yay logic =D

I just got around to watching this week's episode of Gossip Girl. And I only have one thing to say.
AHHHH AHHHH AHHHHH!!!!
I guess that's three things... but still! AHHHH!

....anyway..... 2 days until I finally start finals! It's been getting boring around here, watching too much TV and not studying. But that's going to change. I'm going to study and not watch TV, mostly because I finished Cat's copy of the 1st season of One Tree Hill as well as the stuff I downloaded off iTunes, so I just ran out of shows. But that's probably for the best.

AHHH AHHHH AHHHHH!

Just had to put that in there again ;)

I just had a fabulous idea for my paper for 130.
Except that it's kind of impossible. And not the really expensive kind of impossible. As in... the actually impossible impossible.
Grrr!!!

It's not fair. I went to college to get away from that cycle, so I could be someone cool and new and yet still me. But I'm just stuck in the same fucking circle that I went through in high school, with PYT, with everything. Why is this so hard?

I shouldn't have made this decision. I should have picked somewhere else. Who cares that this is the best school I got into. I felt at the time that this wasn't right, wasn't 100% right. I forced myself to pick here. But I didn't want it. I should have chosen differently. I just wish I could go back in time. It's not fair. It's not fair.

Yes it does.
So I have 2 midterms and a paper due tomorrow. And I've spent all today (and I'm talking pretty much all) studying.
No, I'm not cramming, per se, considering it's only 9:15 and I still have hours and hours until the sun comes up. But I definitely feel like I've studied all day.
I didn't mean to! I meant to get work done over the weekend so I wouldn't be in this situation today. But family stuff took up the whole weekend, literally, and I had a lot less time than I anticipated. Plus the flight home last night was 2 hours delayed. So instead of getting back at 10 and getting a couple hours of work in before bed, I got in at midnight and was so emotionally drained that I couldn't do a single thing.
The sad thing is, it's only been 4 hours of actual work. But it was very concentrated work, and it wasn't all at once. An hour after lunch, a couple of hours between class and dinner, and an hour after eating. Now, according to my very specific schedule, I should be editing that paper. (According to that schedule I shouldn't be blogging right now. But my brain hurts, and my schedule didn't account for that.) But the idea of studying again makes me sad. Maybe I'll take another break and then finish that paper then finish that studying for East Asian Humanities. Yeah... hopefully.
Whatever. Most of what I've needed to do tonight has been done. And like I said... it's early yet. Still have hours and hours until the sun comes up!

 Why is it that when I really, really need to focus on my schoolwork... I totally and completely fail?
I'm in major trouble. It's a quarter to 1, I still have an exam to study for (yes, it's film so it's probably easy... but still!) and a presentation to prep for (once again for film, but this time on Acting, which should be easy!), and I'm silly and should go to bed.

I'm actually glad Oliver's over--I'll actually have TIME now! What timing, I have performances and tech right when the workload got tough. Lucky me.

On the plus side, I like my new skin for LJ. It looks pretty. =) Maybe I'll actually work on my Nano with this inspiration!
I did work on it a little bit today, during my boring astronomy class. We'll see. Once I get caught up, at least.

You know what I want? Amazon's new Kindle. It's like a super-cool ebook reader. I've been reading lots of reviews instead of studying. But it's definitely not something I can justify buying... just like the iPod touch, or new iPod nano. I like them and really would love to have them... but I just don't need it! (Not to mention I'm not reading as much as I'd like nowadays. I listen to lots of music though... that count?) Maybe after the price comes down, or maybe for the holidays. Or maybe after tomorrow morning, when I realize how not exciting it really is. 

I think I'm just tired.
And I've got a long night to go!

 So these last weeks have been pretty crazy. Oliver opened last weekend, which meant insane amounts of Tech and a full weekend of shows (matinees and evening performances after a week of tech=very tired feet). And then we have one more weekend of it this weekend and it's done. So crazy to think it's only got a couple more days left! I'm a little bummed, but more excited to be done so I have more time. I'm pretty behind in my classes because of this. Lots of reading I need to do these next few days.

Speaking of behind, I'm now a few days behind in terms of Nanowrimo. Nothing I can't manage... but I'm just lacking the energy. Maybe this show is just taking too much out of me, or I don't like my plot as much anymore... I dunno. Call it a sophomore slump (though more like a junior slump... since technically I started 3 years ago but didn't get anywhere). I just don't care as much. but if I do decide to care after Oliver's over, I'll have Thanksgiving and lots more free time after that to catch up and keep writing.

 I discovered something fabulous the other day: Streaming TV. My friends watch their shows online instead of on the TV and I was always, "the quality sucks or blah blah blah." But going to the official websites for many shows makes it so much easier... and totally legal too! And yeah, there are those stupid commercials. But whatever. I'm enjoying catching up on stuff that TiVo refuses to record, for some strange reason.

I got my housing info last week. I'm in an upperclasmen/ apartment half a mile off campus. I was SO SO bummed, but I'm (mostly) ok with it now. Private bathrooms? More space? Kitchen? Living room? Air conditioner? Sounds good to me! And I found my roommate and another theatre major living in my apartment building on Facebook, and they both seem nice. Sure, that could change once I actually meet them--IMing and Facebook messaging is not a good way to really get to know someone--but so far, so good.

So far, so good, in terms of Nano!

 My first day I got in about 5k, which was a great headstart. The next few days went OK--not too great, since I kind of got burnt out after all that enthusiasm from the first day. And today, instead of forcing myself to write right in order, I skipped ahead a few minutes in story-time, so my FMC and MMC(?) finally meet and start talking. And it all started flowing right then and there. Got 3700 words in today, and probably could have done more had it not been getting late. Things are picking up! 

I'll be glad just to get out of this introductionary section. I need to get into the meat of the story. I think it'll really get easier from there.

And I've gotten in this whole week's goal in already! Since this week is Tech Week for Oliver, I'm at the theatre 5 hours/day, so I planned to get in a lot of writing before and after this week and then take it easy this week - 1000 words/day. 

Simply put, if I followed my specific plan, I would have 15,500 words at the end of this week.
If I followed the standard 1667/day method, I'd have 16,670 words at the end of the week.
It's Monday. I have 16,231.
Needless to say... I'm good for now! =)

But once Tech Week gets kicking, we'll see how it goes. Especially with all the reading my classes suddenly decided to spring on me this week! Who knows... there's a good chance that all my non-Tech Week time'll be focused on hw, not Nano, since my word count's safe for now. We shall see!

finding a pencil
pizza with sausage
2258 words at start....

Ok, so those aren't actually the lyrics. But I'm excited! First words of the day turned into over 2000 total. Less than 800 left for today's total goal. Looks like I should be A-OK today! And I still had lots to say; I just need to get to bed.

Well, good night! Wish me luck for the days to come!