Burnt-out Sunday

Who is ready for fall break? This student is! Ugh. I've never had so much trouble waking up in the morning as I am now. I thought I could do this 8AM thing at first, it didn't seem so bad.. now, though, the struggle is real.

NO MORE 8AM CLASSES. EVER.

Anyway, this week has been okay. Monday I had classes. Tuesday I didn't. Wednesday I had classes. Thursday I didn't. Friday I had classes. SAME OLD SAME OLD.

BUT! On Friday, HSC held a lip-sync battle inspired by Jimmy Fallon and Emma Stone. There IS a video of the performance and I will have it up ASAP along with a duet I did with Nathan to Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'" as well. But I won! It was really cool, and everyone was just really really into it. Some people did songs not even to compete, just cause! My first two songs were only a minute! I started off with "Hit Me Baby One More Time," which I dedicated to Rachel, and for my second song performed the less-known "First Love" by the Macabees because of the fun play-on-words the song has. For the final song I did the full performance of "Love Me Dead" by Ludo, which is crazy and perfect for such an outrageous event.

Friday night Nathan and I settled in to binge watch a new TV show (Log Horizon-- an anime about people who become trapped in a virtual-reality video game) when suddenly, the TV turns off. Cortana turns off. The lamps turn off. But the ceiling light stays on. Both really confused, we went over to my roommates room to find out what happened. HER outlets were still working, as were the outlets in my bathroom...

So what gives???

We called the front desk and the VERY nice maintenance supervisor walked me through flipping a breaker (???) which didn't work, then one of the apartment managers (I assume that's who she was. She knows me and a lot of other apartment people by name and handles problems) came up in her pajamas, flipped the CORRECT breaker, and found out we had a trip. So maybe that's what's caused it? Not sure.

So the outlet power is back. Maintenance will be here Monday to look at the trip. Thankfully the breaker box isn't in my room!

However, there were a few interesting things this week...

Gorgeous sky outside Sunday evening. Look at those clouds! Beautiful!

Construction on the school's new dorms is under way... I keep hearing rumors about a housing shortage but I don't think I have to worry about that because I live off-campus now, yay! What's funny about this is that when you look closely, you can see the base red color of the building has been sprayed on, yet around the corner there was a worker up on a uppy-risey-truck thing painting the windowsills the same color...

I've started eating lunch at honors hall. It's really nice. Couches. Decor. Plug-ins for chargers. Everyone shuffles in as their classes end, and I usually end up staying here from around 11:30 to 2:00, because I have class at 2:20. Then Rachel and I walk over to our classes cause they're close, and then we meet up and walk right back. It's awesome.

This is what I called "getting trained." It means when you're walking towards the tracks with the intent to cross, from either side, a train appears out of nowhere and lasts for ten minutes. Some people try to run and make it. Some people DO make it. But most of us just sit and wait.

Messy desk aside, look what I made! AND I STILL HAVE ANOTHER TUBE OF THESE IN THE FRIDGE! YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

Ready for DnD! We have out sessions every Saturday in a very old room in the front (back?) of South Hall-- the guy's dorm on campus. No one but one kid ever comes in, and he just comes in to use the ice machine. It's pretty great. I got that hat for $3.

Post-McDonald's run. Sessions usually run for a really long time so we break for food. Sometimes it's pizza. Sometimes it's McDonalds. I packed two chicken biscuits to eat but did trade some candy with the group in return for a large fry... yum!

AND VOILA! The infinity scarf I finished last night while two of the other players were locked in a battle-to-the-death with an avatar-of-the-god-of-destruction orc for right to leadership of their tribe! I'm hoping to do a sweater soon, but after looking it up I will probably stick with scarves. 

In other news, I still have to write a book report on a management book about focus. Not complaining, but... UGGGGH SO BORING BOOK REPORTS ARE FOR MIDDLE SCHOOLERSSSSSSSS. Give me a huge paper to write and I can do it, but a book report??? I barely forced myself to write the introduction, and I'm not even done yet!!! do book reports have a thesis??? HOW DOES ANY OF THIS WORK???

ANYWAY. Tonight I'll be heading over to Bartlett to eat dinner with Nathan's family, a Sunday tradition we have. Tonight we're having jambalaya, Nathan's favorite. Afterwards Nathan and I are going to run down to Michael's (craft shop) down poplar and I'm going to pick up more yarn while he looks at craft things.

That's all that's going on here! I'm going to go have a snack.

Mass Update!! Get ready for a long read...

My 8AM has been going alright. It's a Organization and Management course. I've missed it a few times. Ms. Alderson, the professor, is really really nice (I'm in the kitchen making chicken biscuits and my roommate is in her room on speaker phone.. bit noisy) and the classwork is usually interesting. I guess I'd rather learn about management in an workplace setting (the guys upstairs are stomping! more noise!) than read about it from a textbook. The class is small, the chair are comfortable, and I usually have coffee, which all help a lot!

Ms. Alderson is also writing a recommendation letter for my CLS application, discussed below...


Japanese is going alright as well. I'm less likely to miss that class because if I know I will (i.e. when I had that horrible sickness I did not want to spread) I have to email her pictures of my completed homework before class time because there are no late grades. (I turned on some music  to drown out the speakerphone). Other than that, Japanese is just okay. I find it a lot harder because it's a lot more complicated grammatically than Chinese. Chinese has a little "picture" for every word. Sometimes they can have three or more different contextual meanings!! But other than memorization, the grammar (语法）is really, really easy. Usually, there aren't even any tenses! You just slap a word on to show completion, or just add "yesterday" (昨天）or something to add time context. Japanese, though... Japanese is crazing.


Chinese is really great! My teacher is super, super sweet! She's from Wuhan, and she has a little son. She's very patient with the class and makes fun powerpoints with interesting pictures to keep us engaged. However, the class can get a bit dull. That's the downside of taking two different Chinese courses-- one in high school and one in college. The material does spill over sometimes. Like now we're learning about weather (天气), but I learned about that in highschool! Raining (下雨), snowing （下雪), windy （有风), etc. So sometime class can get a little boring. (Oh dear, there's a train (火车）now...) But I still really love it. I'm so excited about this scholarship I'm applying for.


A class I'm still not sure how to feel about is Intercultural Communication. On one hand, I love my classmates and my professor, Dr. Hendrix (who is also helping me with my essays!), but the material can sometimes be... A little less pertinent than my other classes. Important, of course, but harder to connect to. Sometimes it just makes me so uncomfortable, honestly. We talk about things like racism, inequality, privilege, interracial relationships, happiness, social class... Sometimes that just makes me feel uncomfortable because it's something I've always been aware of but never been in a college course that shoves it in my faces and makes me acknowledge the inequity in our country... Which can be a doozy! But I still kind of like it. I feel like a better person after this class.


Now to extracurriculars! If you didn't know, I'm treasurer of Honors Student Council (HSC). That means I fill out most of the paperwork, make sure we have money, organize fundraisers, and then make sure our events are going okay, help plan events, work with the club at meetings, etc. Sometimes I feel really overwhelmed doing it all and question if I really want to be there when I could be playing League of Legends. But when I sit down at Honors Hall after class and look around, I figure that if I truly have a desire to be involved, then this is the best place for me!


Speaking of events, HSC has had several events that have been fairly successful. (More music to drown out the noise upstairs. is it basketball? is it wrestling? is someone continuously falling over?) The first being our Spooky Scary Halloween bake sale. We raised about $160 dollars for HSC, which is great! Yeah! Woo! The second was our Super Smash Bros Game Night. That was a little less popular than I had hoped, and setting it up made me SUPER SUPER stressed, but overall it was fun. We raised a little over $100 for St. Jude I think, so yay! Enough to run the hospital for less than a second. :P


But internships! I'm astounded by the amount of opportunities I am finding this year. I'd love an internship at Fed-Ex, but... I recently found out Riot Games has an internship program that is really small. If I got accepted I'd be flown out to work in SANTA MONICA, CA! Woo-wee! It's for the summer of 2015, which is the same as my scholarship, which I have a higher statistical change of getting into. I figure I'd send in an application anyways.... just in case!!! I've already got my cover letter planned... Just gotta work on that ol' empty resume...


The CLS program (Critical Language Scholarship program) is a State Department-funded study abroad experience that spans 7-10 weeks in your target country. It's fully-funded, meaning the only thing my family would pay for is getting me to the airport I'm flying out of!

Ideally, I would be working in China with a large group of other students. I'll be applying for the Intermediate level. I''d get a full year of credits from it, which means the pace will be INSANE! BUT I'M SO EXCITED!!!! WHAT STUDENT DOESN'T WANT TO GET PAID TO STUDY THE THINGS THEY LOVE????? OH MY GOODNESS. THINKING ABOUT IT MAKES ME SO EXCITED. SORRY. MOVING ON!

If I do qualify for the CLS program, I will start planning a study abroad experience for Japan as well, because that is also a language I want to learn. I'm not AS dedicated to Japanese as I am Chinese, so this is something that ideally I would LIKE to happen but doesn't HAVE to happen. But this would be for the Spring of 2016 (gasp! a whole semester away from Memphis! can I do it???). So far I have only considered Summer programs, but it may be better to do it within a semester... It just makes me so nervous! Ahhh!




To close, I have some personal,  if dorky, insight.

College is hard. Very few things about it are easy. You're far from home, with a large workload and a huge amount of pressure to succeed, mostly from myself. Now that I'm thinking about internships, I'm forced to consider job options and what I want to do with my life, which has led to a few existential crises.
 ("Why am I here? What do I want to do with my life? Will I enjoy it or feel tied down?" -me

"Mackenzie please get off the floor." -my friend Rachel, who lends me her blankets to burrito and promptly tells me how silly I'm being and that I'm fine).

So instead of turtle-ing like I did last semester, I'm trying to face these soul-crushing problems head-on! My role model for that is....

Yep. Mackenzie's role model for powering through situations is an anime character. To be fair, I watched this show on AMERICAN TV when I was a kid, so... 

An anime character named Usagi (oo-sa-gee) Tsukino. Her name literally means "rabbit of the moon." Why did I choose such an off-the-wall role model? How do you connect with an animated character so strongly? What???

Well, Usagi Tsukino is the main character of "Sailor Moon," a VERY popular anime that has reached from Japan to all across the world. I started watching when I was a kid, and kind-of kept up with it up until now, a college sophomore. Usagi's secret is that she's actually a super-hero! She fights evil as the heroine Sailor Moon!

She also has a really cool transformation sequence.

Sailor Moon works with other girls, from Sailor Mercury to Sailor Jupiter. Each girl has her own power: Mercury has water, Venus has light and love, Mars has fire, and Jupiter has lightning. You're probably asking why the LIGHTNING isn't my role model. Or FIRE. Sailor Moon can't do ANY of that. She's often portrayed as unsure, weak, and, well....

You can see where this is going, huh?

But Usagi is actually the most important hero. None of the other guardians can work without her. What Usagi does is support and tie everyone together with friendship. Cheesy, right? I always thought so, too, until I started watching the re-released Sailor Moon Crystal. I noticed things I couldn't pick up when I was a kid. Usagi is whiny, lazy, and a lot of other things I can relate to, but deep down, she's strong! She supports everyone and does her best to push forward even when things seem impossible!

I don't know if I can explain it. I guess everyone has their weird role model. I guess it's just nice knowing that a show depicting such a "weak" protagonist can be so successful and popular. It's more realistic, I guess. The show has actually been cited as a feminine icon for having young women battling the -isms of society. So that's cool too.

So that's what's been going on with Mackenzie. Welcome to life at the University of Macken-phis! (Was that a bad pun? Oh well.)

Getting chilly in Memphis!

I went home monday and tuesday!! Delilah liked how warm the car was... it was a nice visit home! I'll be back again int about two weeks for my birthday. :)

hehehehe

HEHEHEHEHE. All these cookies are for Honor Student Council's bake sale!

Steve Irwin is doing well.

This took forever!!

Yes, for the Halloween bake sale I wore a cyclops monster onesie around the UC for people to buy stuff... Luckily a student (who will be dressed as DEADPOOL) will be joining me to do it again on friday!

the yummy goods!

Overall it's been an uneventful week so far. Tomorrow is date night with Nathan. We're going to Olive Garden! I'm so excited. SPAGHETTI! :D

It's Fall, y'all!

After having recovered from my cold, I went one a wild ride this week! HSC is planning two events next week, a bake sale and a video game night/tournament! I won't be able to make it to the tournament but I'm the one planning the bake sale-- and yikes! There's paperwork to be filled out! Goodies to bake! People to man the table!

Buuuuut I managed, and now it's fall break! I moved my furniture around (with help), did a little laundry, made some muffins,

This is Cortana (my computer) in her new spot int he corner of my room. I just figured She and the mini fridge fit so much better in that spot. 

And then Mackenzie got really excited...

AND THEN MACKENZIE GOT REALLY EXCITED

Lunch! Soooo good!

My first dinstuhl's candy, and probably my last for a while! The pumpkin is made of chocolate but hollow. The chocolate tastes delicious and the candy corn is the best I've ever has (see how shiny it is???) but it was like $7.50. :P

This house's price? Hold your breath. Mom, avert your eyes! $32!! Notice all the cute little figure-lings below it though! Awww!

I told Nathan we could skip buying a huge turkey and just buy this thing for the same price as a decent turkey, at.... $55!

Sick and Stressed

Midterms are this week! I've been really stressed, so that's why I missed a few updates... updates will continue soon!

This looked interesting, so I snapped a pic. But HSC keeps me so busy, I'm not sure...

Uh oh! Detour needed.

Beautiful full moon shown not-so-beautifully through a phone camera.

Some Japanese homework... sooo muuuuch fuuuun!

我病了。

Still feeling sick. Going to make a short post so I can go back to laying down!

Another really cute garden on campus! I'm always tempted to pick these flowers...

Uh oh! Branch down!

Clock tower from the theatre building. 

I stopped for muffins because I am sick and I deserve a muffin. :(

I am also very bad at battleship..

Hopefully I'm feeling better soon! I'm trying to rest up but it's hard with all the stuff going on. But I'm getting it all handled!

今天我很生气。因为我室友的朋友吃我点心，所以不能给我男朋友点心！！！

So today started out at seven in the morning. Some of you may be asking why I was up that early... WELL. It's all because of this thermometer, I guess.

At seven, the fire alarm goes off for about five seconds. When it turns off, I hear the roommates getting up, and when I get up, I smell smoke. Oh no. 

So we all leave, figuring it wasn't safe. After standing outside for ten minutes trying to contact the apartment people, I called Dad and he told me about brand new ACs that give off burning smells when they first turn on.... oh. So we all go back in, the smell is fading, and I try to get back to sleep.

~

Later, I decide to go to kroger because 1) midterms are coming and I might not have time this week. 2) I'm either recovering or getting worse with this cold, so I want to go before I get more sick. 

The kroger near the University of Memphis is insanely nice. Here are some pics I took today!

This is the outside of it! On the right there with the windows they have a little coffee shop, I think, with a sitting area.

The middle of the garden center. This place has EVERYTHING. Pineapples, coconuts, two different kinds of mangoes, starfruit, you name it, they have it!!

Not picture - Giant half-cheese-wheels available for purchase.

An olive bar!!

Boar's Head Deli!

Peach pie, apple pie, cherry pie, sweet potato pie, pumpkin pie...

Frozen cakes and really cool cakes!

The seafood section!!

So I took some cold medicine and drank some tea (thank you mom for making me take tea to my dorm I really appreciate it now) and now I'm working on homework before going to dinner (maybe) with Nathan's family tonight. It's something we do every Sunday and it's really nice. 

~

On the agenda this week...

Monday

              - Meet with Dr. Hendrix about CLS.

              - Begin Studying for Midterms

              - Help advertise for HSC event next friday

              - Talk with Ms. Alderson about recommendation letters

              - Turn in honors student council money solicitation form

Tuesday 

               - Advising appointment for Spring Semester / CLS help

               - CWC meeting with Professor Don to work on essays

               - email now-finalized essays to Study Abroad, Career Services, and recommendation letter writers

               - Go with Nathan to Cookies and Calculus tutoring (to keep morale up)

               - Prepare "cheat-sheet" (don't worry, it's allowed) for Intercultural Comm. quiz

               - Complete MGMT quiz online

Wednesday (oh boy)

               - Intercultural Comm quiz

               - Honors Student Council Meeting

                  -Bake Sale prep

                  -Advertising

                  -October Event Planning

               - Go with Nathan to Calculus tutoring again

Thursday 

               - CLS Essays/Application work

               - Study for Chinese and Japanese midterms

               - Try to relax

Friday

               - Midterms for Chinese, Japanese

               - FALL BREAK

Fun Fridays and Sleepy Saturdays. 今天我很累。

Cute lil pop-up garden that the campus green club puts out. It was so cute!!

This is in the University College building, Brister Hall. I near here for my CLS workshop, so I poked my head in and took a pic. So cool!

This is a picture from the workshop!! It was really helpful. I think I was the only student there who had their essays prepared... that felt pretty nice. For a lot of people it was just an information session instead of a WORKshop. I had the speaker guy read my essays even though he wasn't a CLS reader person and he said they were strong! I also gave him my business card, just cause! It was very very nice.

Look at these cute lil baby birdies in this puddle, it was SO cute!

New hubcaps!! I put one on all by myself! ahahaha!!!!

8:20AM Saturday morning, going to work Campus Day for high-schoolers...

In the shade... It was SO cold! Like 46 felt like 42 cold! There was a band playing across from us and it was really really loud. So it was cold, loud, windy... but fun! I really enjoyed it.

Gracie helping me put the sign up... two business students making a sign. with tape and shiskabob sticks. Gracie was very tired. This was after we accidentally set off the alarm in honors hall...

We did it! Now I'm sitting in honors trying to work on this scholarship essay.... But I'm so tired!