Finally.

I'm in a terrific mood.

Everything is just going so well. Perhaps not my school work -- I mean it's not going terribly. But it's not excellent. I'm definitely a lot more productive than last year though. And today once I recoop, I'm going to get lots of work done. Research for my essay, write my essay, write a rough draft of my article, study for Calculus, study for Philosophy... It might get into tomorrow too apparently.

So I might go home for homecoming, so everyone must go. There's really no other option.

Ashley will be coming to Austin the weekend after that.

And then I'll be home the weekend after that.

Ahh. . .So happy.

Edit:

Oh my god. I just heard about Erin. I don't even know what to say.

I wonder

if I blog too much. Nah!

I'm sitting in bed with my fan blowing on me, music playing, burrito in hand, and a Clementine Izze on my desk. I'm feeling really great. It wasn't so much that it was a long week or a stressful one for me, but I can't describe the feeling of being done with school for a few days. I feel kind of greasy though so I could use a good shower.

Tonight, I'm going to try to rendezvous with Monica, go to the mall with Yasmin, go to an OxFam party (yay! free trade!), then go to Tyler and Mary's apartment.

Or I would be totally fine just laying here for a while.

My family is coming to visit me next weekend. Everyone should hide in their luggages and come visit.

And Nathan, the gay boy, is going to bring his sewing machine up from home and we're going to sew together! Aw, I miss sewing.

Look!

It's me. Sitting and trying to find monica.

Creep.

Look. It's my roommate!

I know

I blog too much.
I really can't help it.
I'm not one of those people who uses talking aloud as their outlet.
I think too much and override my own thoughts to let that happen.

I'm feeling refreshed. I don't know if it's just washing my face and brushing my teeth that did it, but I feel this overwhelming sense of not really clarity, but just ease of mind.

I don't think I've been this at peace with myself since ... I don't even know.
Inevitably I will still have my insecurities, and my worries, but at the same time, I feel like in the long run things will be fine.

Kind of a vague blog, but I'm just feeling good.

Heaven.

I can't really remember the bulk of my dream. But the part that struck me the most where these two people, a guy and a girl. I suppose they both were dead? From what I perceived, it seemed like the girl had died and the guy was following her (Ah, reminiscient of Death Cab's "I Will Follow You Into the Dark"). Well there was this literal dark wall. I think only Cristina or perhaps Jordan will catch this reference, but it looked like the dark wall in Zelda. Before they left, I told them to send me a sign in the sky to let me know that they were okay. I don't know if I really was concerned about their well-being, or rather for my own comfort that there was a heaven. They agreed and stepped into the dark wall.

I looked up into the sky, and I saw this really cheesy cloud formation resembling two figures holding hands.

I thought it was beautiful at the time.
When I woke up, it just seemed so silly.

There's a strange

feeling in my side.

I think it's due to extreme inactivity.

Recap of today:
-- Woke up at 11:30
-- Went to Uses and Abuses of the Bible at 12:30
-- Went to Calculus at 2
-- Ate lunch with Allen at 3
-- Slept until 5
-- Ordered food with Yasmin
-- Lay in bed waiting for food
-- Watched Sex and the City
-- Came back to Blanton 5th
-- Talked to some of the neighbors
-- Sitting in bed

Lots of bullets. Not a lot of activity.
Speaking of bullets, I shot a gun yesterday.

In general, I'm pretty happy.
Wednesday: Trash to Treasure
Thursday: PlaystASIAN 3, haha. Some Asian congregation with Adrian and Ellen

Dudes. Go to Maker Faire with me. For real.

Mondays

Aren't that bad.

list·less [list-lis]

–adjective
having or showing little or no interest in anything; languid; spiritless; indifferent: a listless mood; a listless handshake.

I think I've become bored with life. I'm never really sitting around feeling bored, yet there's just this pull in me for something else.

I think the entire problem is the dichotomy of my personality.

There is the side of me that likes to be independent, that is lazy, that wants to take things day to day, that becomes complacent.

Then there is the side of me that wants to be proactive, that wants to think of the future, that wants to do things with my life, that wants to interact with the world, but is held back because the other part of me won't move because of the temporary strain of hard work.

It might be a disconnection between my mind (which yearns for something more) and my body (which is a lazy piece of lard)

Trivial.

I was sitting in my room when a friend of my roommate came in crying. A mutual friend of theirs had died that day. He wasn't a close friend. Does it matter though? They had known him since middle school. They stood there reminiscing, sometimes laughing about the things he used to do. They remembered about how he was allergic to everything. He couldn't participate in the dissection in their bio class because he would have an allergic reaction. They remembered how small he was. The fact that he was gone didn't seem real.

Meanwhile I was sitting there watching this all take place, not knowing what to say. I could only watch. Everything else seemed so trivial. I wondered how I would react if someone that I knew since middle school (I don't even know of anyone I've known that long) had passed away.

I know that after something tragic happens, everyone suddenly experiences some sort of emotional transformation, but then time passes and they return to their former selves. Things need to change. I need to appreciate what's around me. In that book that I was reading, it tried to help you realize what's important in your life by imagining a funeral of someone close to you. All of your loved ones are there, family and friends. And they all get up to talk about the person who passed away, and then you realize that it's for you. What would you want your family to say about you, your friends, your peers? It's kind of morose talk but it allows you to stand back and take a look at your life and decide what you want out of it.

I still don't really know what I want out of life but I'm going to try to not just take things day to day. I feel like I need to also consider the bigger scope of things instead of just shuffling through the present.

What a day.

Of course I went to class. Blah blah. Then I met up with Charles and Graham to go to ACL.

We watched LCD Soundsystem, which was a really good show. Then they went to watch Queens of the Stone Age, and I headed to see Spoon. I missed Blonde Redhead, which apparently according to Alex Au was a phenomenal performance. I met a girl who goes here to UT and is really cool and we stuck together so we wouldn't get lost on the buses back. But I did catch Bjork, which was really cool. Weird but really cool.

Then we made our way to the buses, catching glimpses of the Killers on the way. We finally got to a bus and I had to pee tremendously. It brought us back to Guadalupe but not back to campus so we made our way to the next bus stop, and finally to Austin's Pizza, where we had pizza rolls and I got to pee.

Then I made my way down to the Quad, and met up with Yasmin and Eric. We headed over to Trevor's house. It was a good time. I really just wanted to relax after a tiring day of music, so I chilled for a decent amount of time. There were so many people there, but I didn't feel like meeting all of them. Finally they left when a rent a cop came by and it was chill again. Yasmin left, and there were only five of us left and it felt tons better without everyone. Walked home, and now I'm in bed, feeling pretty good about today.

So

Happy.

This is

My dorm. It's kind of hard to see but that's basically it'

Panic Attack.

I just had a major freakout. I couldn't find my ACL ticket and I was tearing apart my room.

It was under my bed.
Thank God.

AHHH. Leaving in a couple hours!

Coincidence?

Lately people have been explaining to me their relationship with God. I don't know if the dramatic increase of the topic of religion in my life is because I'm taking a class called Uses and Abuses of the Bible, or maybe I'm supposed to find out more about God.

Skepticism and reason is hard for me to brush aside, but I think now at this time in my life I would be able to look into religion. And not only religion, but my life in general. For most of my life, I have never really lived my own life. That sounds silly, but it's true. Either I followed the guidelines that my parents had drawn out for me, or that which society and my environment had. This is the first time I feel that I'm in control of my own life.

On a more trivial but related note, I can picture myself living on my own for the first time. This experience has aided in making me more of an independent person, I think. Admittedly I am still dependent on my parents for financial and emotional support, but this is the first time in my life that I could ever see myself being my own person. I have never truthfully been able to see myself in the future, but now I can picture myself in a cozy apartment on my own. The details are still a bit vague, but for the first time I can picture it. I know that for most people that comes easily, but I've always struggled with the concept. And I think the reason I couldn't before was because I was never really living for me.

Reevaluation.

Having come to college (and this may sound just silly seeing as I've only been here for what two weeks now?), I may be feeling the change in myself that I had been looking for previously. And it isn't that I've changed really. My personality hasn't changed. My interests haven't changed. But I've been reading this book for class -- Intro to Chemical Engineering of all things. It's called The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Understandably the title kind of gives off the impression that it is a cheesy book full of "Be more assertive" or perhaps "Plan your time effectively" kind of bullshit. Instead it takes a different approach that I actually find myself wanting to actually pursue.

Essentially, the book begins by establishing the problem with society and the problem with our attitudes or perceptions of the world. It's hard to explain altogether, because it takes from all parts of our lives and breaks it down to the essential principles that we should stand by as opposed to the quick fix methods of going about our lives. It reverts back to the methods as broken down by Benjamin Franklin back in the day. It's funny because as time has progressed and technology has progressed, we always want the fast way out and all of the social help books on personality ethics are based on this as well. Think about when you go to school and you read the chapter the night before the test, because you just want to get by. You're not doing it for the pursuit of knowledge, but rather you are wanting a quick way out. I'm guilty of it most definitely. In fact, I don't think I learned a single thing my senior year of high school. I think I've learned more these past two weeks than I did during the entirety of last year. It's so hard to break down exactly what the book is helping you do. But in simple terms, it teaches you how to lead a more fulfilling life. And I think that's the most important thing that I could learn, that anyone can learn.

I know all of this sounds cheesy, but I definitely feel a bit of a paradigm shift in my mindset. It's as though the alignment of reality and my perception of reality wasn't quite in alignment, but I'm starting to feel like it's almost coming into place. It's like when I didn't have glasses, I thought my vision was just fine. I could get by. I didn't think there could be much more that could be done. After I got glasses, I realized everything that I had been missing out on. Everything clarified -- the blurriness became crisp strong lines.

But even as I say this now, I feel that I'm still not at the peak of what I can perceive. Maybe I think everything is clear, but really it's just slightly less blurry. I think that's what growing older is about. Reevaluating, adjusting, and admitting that you don't know everything, that there's potential for improvement.

Did you hear about that?

Woke up in Monica's bed. Was too lazy to go back to my place. Borrowed a shirt.

Tried to catch the bus. The bus was too fast. Walked the rest of the way to class.

Didn't talk in World Lit. Didn't read the right things. Failed to impress professor.

Skipped Calculus. Ate Shrimp Lo Mein with Yasmin. Slept in Philosophy.

Ate chicken nuggets at Littlefield. Went to my room. Took the best nap.

Met Adrian at Carothers. Went to Olive Garden. No time for WalMart. No time for bike.

Dropped Adrian off. Drove to the Quad. Parked on the street. Sitting in bed.

Hello darling.

Today I woke up and took up Yasmin's bed so she had to sleep in her roommate's bed.

Then we went to Kinsolving and ate tasteless pasta, strange stuffed peppers, and something called the London Broil. Needless to say, I didn't eat much.

We went to the T Mobile store where a very cool guy reprimanded me for having Sprint and taking all of their abuses. He told me to be proactive. Very true. He also told us places to go to find cheaper phones. Went to Costco then Target.

My parents came up to bring the brand spanking new looking Eclipse. It looks really good. Like new, man. So we went to Adrian's apartment for a while, then went out for dinner at a delicious Chinese restaurant called Din Ho with my parents, Ellen, Adrian, Kyle, and Yasmin. Just a normal Fernandez family gathering. Duck, Pork, Oyster, and Fish galore. I don't know why I capitalized all of the food. Then back to Adrian's place where I played Life with Adrian, Ellen, Yas, and Ellen's friend Courtney.

I lost miserably.

Then Yas and I headed over to Peter's apartment where we made cookies then successfully did nothing, except write poetry about architecture and watched old Nick shows. Then to Katya's and Anya's house where we continued doing nothing.

Let's see if I can remember mine:

wall space wall floor
window light hall door
around the corner
across the bridge
something something
architecture is

Beauty in line, composition, detail
Skill, proficiency in evey nail

Plank by plank
brick by brick
Created to be geometric

tile ceiling ramp column
rustic homey modern solemn
around the corner
across the bridge
something something
architecture is

I'm pretty sure I'm missing an entire stanza, but eh.

And now I'm here. I was exhausted a little while ago, but not so much anymore.

I need to shower.

I also need to pee again.

Better.

I feel like I haven't listened to music in forever. Usually I'd listen to music in my car. Here I don't drive. I would listen to my headphones on the street but I don't know where they are. Also I've realized that if I'm tuned into my headphones, I look incredibly unapproachable. Only when I'm on my laptop do I listen to music. And I'm rarely in my room so I just never jam. Adrian says he'll let me drive the car (ha) so maybe I'll have more time to jam (especially with the new gangsta sound system) Oh dear I'm going to get killed.

I need to brush my teeth, but I'm too lazy to go down the hall. Pathetic, yes?

It strangely smells like Vicks Vapor Rub in my room right now.

I need to get out of these jeans.

I also need to read the Bible (for class).