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Today was a nice break after yesterday’s hectic schedule. Arunima and I went to breakfast, then headed down to a lecture on success in sciences at CMC. I already have permission to take an astro course from Pomona (I think—I don’t know what my advisor did, but she said I could sign up for it if I wanted), and I was thinking of taking Calc 30 or Beginning Photography after that. Hmmm let me know what you think, or if you have any suggestions.

Lunch was In & Out burger with Harvey Mudd—I think of the four CMC colleges around us, the Mudders are the best. They’re very quiet and shy; therefore you can’t really see them at dances and carnivals, but honestly, that’s how I think I like them. A lot of upperclassmen told us first-years to date the Mudders, because most of them haven’t had girlfriends before, and they treat us Scrippsies right, they’re very sweet. It’s also sort-of a tradition for Scrippsies to hook up with Mudders, I understand. Anyway, the ones I met at lunch were really nice.

I had most of this afternoon to myself—some of you saw me on AIM, I wrote a few emails, then called Mom and Joey at home…they seem jolly. I also worked on scheduling a bit; errk who knows what I want to take. Meh, we’ll figure it out.

There was a 5C Carnival tonight hosted at Scripps; I only showed up for a short while, but at least I can say I showed. There weren’t many people there, aside from Scrippsies and a few Pitzer kids.

Right now the Harvey Mudders think that they have placement exams at seven in the morning tomorrow. Most of them are going to bed right now, to get a good night’s sleep so they can do well on their tests. What they don’t know is they are the butts of a prank that happens every year between Scripps and Mudd—our ever-famous Mudd Run. At three in the morning tonight, the R.A.’s and peer advisors at Mudd are going to wake up the Mudders, shouting that they have to get up for their exams, etc. Then they are going to run the Mudders down our rose garden, and there we will wait in pursuit, water balloons armed! So, we’re all going to get soaked and wet, ’cause the R.A.’s defend their freshmen by soaking us with super soakers, but it’s going to be really funny, and it’s a tradition we girls have been doing against the guys since…well, probably since the schools have opened. So, I better sleep until then…don’t worry, I’m getting my nine hours of sleep!

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After dinner last night we had a “campus safety” seminar. Basically it was to scare us into acting safely (e.g. “lock your bikes,” “lock your dorm,” “safety in small numbers!!!”), but the sergaent who runs our campus safety seems cool. The campus safety people issued us first-years a keychain that is a whistle and has a red light attached to it “to shed an undistubing red glow in dimly lit areas.” You’re supposed to blow your whistle in any emergency (”though honestly it’s never come up,” said the lady), and anyone who hears a whistle is supposed to dial 7200, the campus security extension. This whistle thing is apparently serious business, because if anyone just blows the whistle for fun or anything, there’s a $50 fine.

Later that evening the Scrippsies headed down to Harvey Mudd for an improv night, which was really funny, obviously. I ran into Grant, from Tucson, one of Diana’s best friends. I didn’t know he was going to Mudd, and he didn’t know I was going to Scripps, but we were pretty happy to see each other.

This morning was really hectic—we had to take language and math placement exams. I tested into Calc 30, which makes up for my hideous Spanish score! Oh well, I’m happy with my results.

Then we did some advising/scheduling stuff. In all honesty, it they gave me a classics professor for advising, and I don’t think she really knows how to advise the kind of academic calander I want, so I feel a bit on my own. If you have any suggestions on what I should take, I’d be much obliged, people!

Then Arumina and I went on a walk, and afterwards was dessert at our Dean’s house. She’s really nice; she hosts Thanksgivings and other food stuff, and yes, we went to HER HOUSE. She introduced herself and made sure she knew all our names by heart, we all felt so touched. And her pastries were good.

Then Arumina and I went to the Frosh Aid, a sort-of dance, mingling thing. It wasn’t too fun, but we both were able to dance with a few guys, which was fun. They were some Pomona dudes, very nice guys. See, Scripps girls get to mingle with guys, the only difference is, our dorm rooms are cleaner than those co-eds ~_*

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Heh, nice internet connection here…

Anyway, I’ve arrived at Scripps. Right now I’m on the school computer…my iBook is getting configured, they’ll give my baby back to me tomorrow morning. The dorm is HUGE….a walk-in closet, to give you an idea. My dorm also has (for both my roommate and me) a big lamp, a giant desk (my iBook fits snugly underneath), a walk-in closet, a sink, a bed, dresser, and a bookcase. It’s twice the size of the NAU dorm I stayed in in the AIPA journalism camp last summer, and I’m not exaggerating. If you walk down the hall, there is a bathroom (ladies only :dur:), a browsing room with Renaissance paneling (like, for reading and stuff. It’s so pretty!) that has a huge shelf full of books, and balconies galore. Then downstairs is a “living room.” If you’ve seen the Harry Potter movie and are familiar with the Gryffindor Common room, it looks kind of like that, only more light comes in. There’s a pretty window seat where I imagine I’ll probably do most of my studying (though I imagine that browsing room wouldn’t be so bad ~_*) My roommate seems cool.

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Mom [driving by a new Walgreen's built on Tangerine]: They’re building another Walgreen’s??
Jimmy: Yep, that’s Tucson…a bunch of dirt and mountains, with an occasional Walgreen’s in between.

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Jimmy: I have a 135 percent in math!
Ryan: Wow! So what do you have in there?
Jimmy: An “A.” Why, what would you think I’d have with that grade?
Ryan: Well, you know, maybe it loops around the alphabet or something after you hit 100, so that would mean you’d have a “W”….

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A few quick notes before I leave in (*checks clock*) 40 minutes:

Although I’ll still leave my earthlink account open, my email address WILL change when I get there. I have all your addresses stored on my iBook, so I’ll just email the lot once I’m hooked up.

Macs don’t have that Buddy List configurer thing on AIM, so unless you’re already on my iBook Buddy List (doubtful), you’ll have to IM ME next time we talk, okay?

You know, it’s amazing how the Internet is the only thing in my life that will honestly be the exact same once I get there: Cristal, Jill, Lynn, Deepinder, and everyone else will still be on my Buddy List, with their lives, talking, and so forth. It really makes me appreciate this amazing tool.

WEEEE BYE BYE!

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This morning I packed my bags. I was pretty depressed the entire time doing it, but Eva was a big help. I still think I overpacked. I took all my clothes (you know you’re screwed right there, but I figured, Hell, I have no clue what the feck they wear up there, so I might as well take the lot and then give away more up there, too), my iBook, backpack, the photo album, pillows (and linens, stuff like that), sleeping bag, CD’s (in a CD case, not the jewels!), stuff we bought at Target, a coffee machine (an essential for college!), my writing, journal, posters, my bicycle (that’ll be a big pain to drag), and that’s about it. Eva talked me out of bringing the stained glass window. I hope my roommate’s not mad; she sounded excited about it when I mentioned it, but I guess we can always get it brought up when the parent-types visit in October.

Jenn told me Ms Madden had a few “last minute” computer questions, so I went down to journalism for one last visit. That was jolly, though I missed seeing Jenn and Jess :(

Mom took Eva and me out to Yokohoma Rice Bowl. Fun. We also went to Goodwill to drop off what I gave away, and then we went to Bookman’s (I bought Orson Scott Card’s Sarah), and then to the Foothills Mall, where Eva got me a birthday present: a nice, practical duffle bag from Samsonite. So, I packed what I’ll be wearing between tomorrow-Thursday in there.

In the closet of my room, I found a picture of Leeann and me, in sixth grade. There we were, the two of us, smaller than Jimmy, perched atop an oversized log. Both of us had scraggly hair, t-shirts, worn-out jeans, sneakers, braces, and the slightest hint of our growing up: earrings on our newly peirced-ears. I looked and looked and looked at it for a long time. Then I took the picture and stuck it in the front pocket of my CD case. I’ll find a special spot for that picture once I get up there. It reminded me of the better part of my childhood years~

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I WAS A SWEET CHILD
you’re parents were lucky with you. you’re sweet.
innocent. helpful. and cute.
what kind of child were you?
(brought you by april)

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Heh…I just read Cristal’s schedule, and feel pretty jealous, actually! If that was my freshman schedule, with all those art/writing classes, I’d be as happy as an upperclassman! My frosh schedule was so dumb. Let’s see if I can remember it:

1. World History (boring as hell, Ms Malone would DRONE ON AND ON!!!!!!)
2. Algebra I (math for dummies—they put me in accelerated the year after)
3. Honors English 9 (Yay Mr Quinn’s class!)
4. Stagecraft (second semester, not first)
5. Journalism 101 (that was pretty boring, we weren’t on Palantir, but we had some good times in that class, too—it’s where I met all me Palantirski comrades!)
6. Beginning Drama (had to get that Fine Art credit out of the way, right?)
7. Integrated Science (THE ABSOLUTE MOST HELLISH CLASS I’VE EVER TAKEN IN ALL MY SCHOOL EXPERIENCE! WHAAAA MR CUBBERLY WASN’T KNOWN AROUND CDO AS “MR CUBBERLY-DICKHEAD” FOR NOTHING, YOU KNOW!!!)

So, you can see why I’m envious of Cristal! Well, good luck, hon.

This morning I went to church (whoa, I bet you weren’t expecting me to say that one!!!!), then in the afternoon Mom and I went with Sarah and her mom to go thrift-store shopping, then afterwards to coffee. Mom and I both had SUCH a great time with Sarah and her mom! Seriously, that was the absolute best. I didn’t really buy much, except a three-hole punch at Saver’s, and then at Thrift City, Sarah and I encountered a bunch of mugs.

So, Sarah and I looked for the most tasteless tea mug I could possibly buy, and eventually Sarah found it: it’s got on it a picture of a hunky guy (even Mom agreed he was hot), and near the handle, it says, “Actually, I’m not really thirsty…I just like holding this mug!” BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Yeh, so tomorrow I’m going to have to start packing or something :sniffle:

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I’ve been feeling really depressed about leaving as of late. I keep randomly tearing up at some points, and I get really nervous. I guess it’s called angst, or “the reds,” as Holly puts it in Breakfast at Tiffany’s. I’m excited too, but also don’t want to leave home. It’s like two Talya-personalities have entered my soul, a nice one and a mean one. “You don’t want to leave home,” says the mean one (though sometimes it’s the nice one). “How can you leave Grant and Mom and Dad and the Catalina Mountains behind? Don’t you have any regard for home?” “But Scripps is so pretty!” the nice one (though sometimes it’s the mean one) argues. “Don’t you want to see the pretty campus again and live in your dorm and do something productive with your life?” “Ah,” says the mean one (though sometimes it’s the nice one) again. “But think of ALL THAT WORK they’ll have you do! You don’t want to be that busy all day long…” “Better to be learning SOMETHING than to do NOTHING all day! And you don’t really want to work at Loew’s for the rest of your life, do you?” “Bah, to hell with you,” says the mean voice (though sometimes it’s the nice voice), and then I randomly cry.

Yeh, so aside from that, today was a pretty good day. Eva woke me up after I was having this bizzare dream so that we could go see Simone with her set of cheap friends who wanted to get the matinee show (I still think paying ANY money for a movie is riduculous, after a summer of free tickets…).

And I’ll bet you dogs to doughnuts that you weren’t expecting me to bold this area of my blog tonight. Usually my bolded stuff is not about what is happening but what I think. Well, have you ever thought for a moment that what I think comes partially from what is happening? I have control over your bolded areas. Muahahahahaha!

Anyway, about s1m0ne—it was actually pretty good! I was actually pretty surprised that I liked it so much, because Rotten Tomatoes shows that only 48 percent of the reviewers liked it. I think their main complaint about the movie is, it is a pretty major satire on Hollywood, and the butt of the jokes happens to be the press/the reviewers.

I found Al Pacino’s performance humorous, the storyline stimulating, and the themes of appearance versus reality smart and provoking. Basically if you liked Niccol’s The Truman Show, you’ll probably like Simone. It’s the same themed-movie, but Simone is also different altogether. It’s not quite as sentimental as Truman Show, and obviously Simone is not real (she actually plays herself! Meaning, she really was a computer).

Then I went to Best Buy with Dad, and used a gift certificate Uncle Tom gave me for my birthday…I got a stack of CD-RW’s, which come with a mail-in rebate (so essentially I’ll only be paying $5 for it), Moby’s Animal Rights CD, and some batteries.

I’m just loving Animal Rights. It’s very different from 18, Play, and I Like to Score, but in a cool way. All of Moby’s albums have personalities of their own, and Animal Rights is yet again different. When I was first listening, I was thinking, “dear lord, heavy metal Moby? This just doesn’t sound right.” But after listening to it later this afternoon and again today, I’m really liking it…the lyrics to his heavier songs are as cool as phuck, and his instrumental/quiet songs are probably the prettiest I’ve heard yet. Yay, Moby!