Being Undead is work

So this weekend Ben came in to visit and got into town around 1 am Friday night (or Saturday morning, if you want to be technical). I spent the hours leading up to that playing apples to apples for Ginger's birthday, which was fun, and watching stupid internet videos. "The word is boisterous.... who is Helen Keller?" will be strong for a while. The rest of Friday night was chill.

Saturday afternoon was spent at the new restaurant/bar on Green at Red Rocks. As it was opening weekend, they had everything as a special down to $3, but were constantly running out of either chicken or burgers and had a ridiculously long wait. The atmosphere was ok to enjoyable, the music was kind of crappy, and the food was good - but probably not worth the regular price. The onion straws are good though.

From there, zombie makeup ensued, which was amazing. Oatmeal hurts to peel off. The Fishing with Dynamite show was really good. Running around with a zombie mob is... crazy. Zombies with a conscience! I heard/watched Thriller performed 3 times, though apparently it happened about 7 times before that, took over an international party, took over late night, and watched the radio station broadcast Thriller for all the zombies. It was pretty amazing.

Pictures from October are available here.

The night wrapped up with Boone's farm, Nightmare Before Christmas, and Pokey sticks. Delicious. Tim and the guys have a new kitten. Adorable. Yes, this weekend was happy. And it was really good to see Ben and get quality time to hang out with him. Too bad he didn't stay longer, but so it goes. Today I had my prebreak for ASB, and let me just say - my group is awesome. I've really lucked out with groups that have bonded right off the bat for the last 2 trips I've gone on (summer doesnt count as a regular trip since we only met twice before leaving...). More publicity: www.illinoisasb.org


Oatmeal hurts to peel off.

Why Being an Engineer Rocks

Sunah: k, leaving grainger
Sunah: I might get nerd cooties

Pete: Did you go see the movie yet?
Lauren: hmm? no, leaving in like an hour
Lauren: i'm at work right now
Lauren: haha popcorn still sounds good, if thats what you're asking
Pete: Oh, okay
Lauren: i dont hate myself yet
Pete: Oh no, popcorn will sound good right up until you're hugging your stomach at night and moaning and groaning about it
Pete: But when that happens, just think about everything that you can mix with gravy. Trust me. It'll make you feel better

1. Talking your way into getting 11 points back on a test
2. Thinking all other tests are easy. Because, lets be honest, engineering teaches you how to take tests and solve problems. I'm not saying other majors and other tests aren't hard, just relatively its less of a bother.
3. Clean women's restrooms

Ugh. What am I going to do with my life? Teach for America, Industry, Academia? UGGGGH.

Alrighty this should be a quick post because otherwise Megan K will hunt me down for not taking care of myself. I started running a fever tonight at SF training, so that's no good.

I had people over for dinner on Thursday, which was amazing. I need more time to host dinner parties, it was a lot of fun. Though I still need to do the dishes from that (and get my life together enough to clean my room at least a bit).

Friday was fun, basically went to Happy hour at 5 and played games to two movies (Chronicles of Riddick and Slither) which was fun and then just generally hung out. The majority of the day Saturday was spent rock climbing in Bloomington and attending the Watery Domestic show at the Iron Post, which was pretty sweet. Today was about 10 hours of meetings, but this week doesn't look too stressful so that's a start.

Time to sleep, so I don't get sicker. The future is scary, though, and I don't even want to think about it. Except Trivia Night on Wednesday and how awesome that is going to be.

My Old Kentucky Home

Yes, coming home this weekend was glorious. We'll just pretend like this next week is not going to happen yet, I'm not at all ready for it.

At any rate, being at home is weird, being able to run into people at bars that I've known since 3rd grade or since we were 4 or whatever. Funny how the people that one tries to see when they go home changes. I know it certainly has for me. Funny that Bailey was in town, even though we both go to school in Illinois.

Today was awesome though. Started off with brunch at alafalfa's with Alixa and Colby and talked about them and China. Followed that up with a trip out to visit Ben's mom, which was a nice talk and a play with the dog, Fletcher. Coming home to a dog that knows you is pretty sweet. Went to Evan's from there and watched a few episodes of season three of Arrested Development, followed by a trip to Liquor Barn and Coffee Times. At Coffee Times we attempted to aid former Backstreet Boy member Keving Richardson and his mom connect to a live stream of the football game. (I am serious, this really happened.) This was further followed by an evening of Rachel French, Grace, and Bailey, along with an appearance by Dan, and Rachel's mom and friends. Basically, it was an evening full of good food and wine (second night in a row with chmapagne and salmon) and dancing around the kitchen table. Totally awesome. Then went back to Evan's and talked for another couple of hours.

At any rate, I'm about to fall asleep as I type but I will pass on one of the dinner jokes. "What is another name for a maxi pad?" "I don' know, what?" "A man-hole cover".

Nature is nowhere rectangular

Ok, so we'll start off with the bad news... I got a speeding ticket today. I knew as soon as we discussed how I'd never been pulled over that we needed to stop talking right then. To make matters worse, it was by a cop on foot in the middle of the highway. Weird. So there's that to take care of.

But everything else is good news, so that's exciting.
Retreat went off SO incredibly well. Success is measured by how big of a mess you made, and we covered the floor of the K rooms with construction paper. People were mingling and the sense of PRIDE that came from that night was just incredible. I followed that just-shy-of-an-all-nighter-by-three-hours with volunteering at I-Help out at the humane society. We were mostly picking weeds with our bare hands but did get some time to play with the animals, so that was really exciting. I want a kitten now - I think that my housing for this summer, next fall, and next spring (3 seperate locations, possibly, or definitely two) should be determined by pet availability. This should all be followed up fabulously by an ASB SF and Board outing to Curtis Orchard on Sunday. Met my Fall ASB group on Tuesday at Orientation, and that was pretty sweet too.

Lets see... I had an exam on Monday, that wasn't so hot, and an exam tomorrow for which I'm not studying. Big dinner plans for tomorrow night. Today I drove to Indianapolis to hear Edward Tufte give a speech that (aside from the ticket)rocked my socks off. The presentation was pretty interesting (powerpoint is making people dumb) and I can not wait to be able to really flip through my new books. They're so pretty. I also adore the people that we travelled with, and company is always the make or break factor in a road trip. I managed to sell two people on Lynn O'brien's cd, so that always makes me happy. Everyone should buy her cd, and then you'll be happy too.

I already have one internship offer for this summer, so that's ridiculous. I have a bunch more interviews coming up so we'll see what happens because of that. I also made a promise to myself not to accept a job somewhere that would not pay for me to see the city/location before hand - I feel that the corporate culture is absolutely essential to enjoy and experience before commiting to working for any company, so we'll see how that goes. I've been selected for at least 2 more interviews, so that's sweet.

I had a good chat with Emma the other day. Basically it comes down to figuring out what we want to do with our lives and how... having too many options is a bad thing. We're spoiled to be able to complain about it, but its probably as stressful as not knowing what you want to do. Its really a shame there aren't more interdisciplinary opportunities on campus - why do some of these professors not know each other? At any rate, I'm majorly feeling the pull between industry and academia and Teach for America and non-profit-type-stuff. Even if I choose industry there's a struggle between HCI and something like consulting or technical sales - who knows. Its weird having to think about the future in terms of CAREER and to think about life in terms of settling down and making decisions based on other people. I know I don't want to code for the rest of my life, I know I NEED engagement in work, I know I need people to be heavily involved in work, but beyond that, who knows.