Extreme Dorm Makeover!

So last night at about 11pm inspiration struck my roommate and I as we began to discuss how we could move around our room. Our room is a very awkward shape, and we have a lot of furniture to accommodate: two beds (bunkable), a futon, two side tables, two dressers, a fridge,
two desks with accompanying hutches and chairs. After the inspiration struck we started moving around furniture, and really the only place we got was making a mess!

Then in the process of moving our fridge, we pulled the door off (okay I did, and it was an accident) but we laughed so hard. Looked at each other and just left it to deal with later. And we move the room around some more, if you'll notice the futon has found a home outside of the picture. But a calamity was about to happen when my roommate (S) seen below, knocked over her hutch and sent a 300 piece set of plastic silverware flying!

Four hours later... Tada! Doesn't it look like something out of an Ikea catalogue? Wait, everything but my China painting and the hutches hiding in the back are from Ikea. Who'd of thunk?

Me enjoying a nice break on the couch, after it was all done.

My roommate on her bed enjoying the break too!The dressing alcove!From another angle. Our desks. Yes, it took us hours, but not until first light. We went to bed about 3:30 and this photo was taken this morning. If you can't tell my desk is the one on the right.And last but not least, Stringbean says hi! He had quite the busy night and I am sure he wasn't happy, but he has more sunlight now in our new room. I bet he loves it as much as we do.

Finally (and just for my mom) the layout before and after... I can't tell you what a difference it makes, it really feels like being in a completely different room. It almost makes you believe in Fengshui. And by the way we did end up getting our fridge put back together.

.

Oh me, oh my, oh ants!

Some of you might recall that last fall shortly after moving into my basement apartment, I had an infestation of spider crickets! I still shudder thinking about them.

So I just shook my head when moving in to the dorm last Sunday, I found 5 ants crawling across my bed. I figured that since my stuff had been in storage perhaps they had transferred to my bed when I was unpacking. I squished them and said if I find more I will call facilities. Then on Tuesday or Wednesday I was studying at my desk and I had an ant crawl across my arm! I said okay one more I will call facilities. Well yesterday I was putting together tables from Ikea and I looked down. The carpet was moving! There was a line of ants crawling across the floor.

Well finally I called facilities and guess what? The facilities department is closed on the weekend. And Monday is Labor Day so they are closed then too! So I went to CVS and bought a can of ant spray, I sprayed the area and they seem to have dissipated. Oh the wonderful things life throws at you, or in this case crawls at you.

The First Day of School

Today was the day... okay, "THE" day was actually 17 years ago, and my parents dressed me in a blue and white striped dress. With a barrette in my hair and tears in their eyes they took the obligatory photographs and filled with thoughts that their little girl was growing up way to fast, they took my hand and walked me into the kindergarten classroom at Open Window School. Boy have the years passed by and now the time has come... I am all grown up. No photographs today, but if there were they would show that with excitement, not tears, brimming I began my first day of my senior year of college.

I woke early (5:45am) and drove a friend to the airport before returning to campus to start my day. Even though today was Wednesday, Monday classes met (I know it is a Georgetown Thing). So my sole class was in the afternoon and it had several other students that I know from previous semesters along with myself wandering around the building looking for an elusive room number 270. It turns out that it is a tuked away conference room. The room held a camera mounted near the projector, and the 18 of us all sitting in leather swivel chairs around the mahogany table. The course on the silk road is being taught in tandem with a course at Fudan University in Shanghai and we are hoping for many opportunities for cross-cultural communication and education. And since the University is all over the opportunity to increase ties with China we were treated to the posh accommodations. Then again it just might have been because they felt sorry for us, being that we are the guinea pigs in this. Regardless, after the first day of class and knowing the work load involved I am even more excited.

The day also included 2 trips to Leo's Dining Hall (which I am going to try to muster throughout the semester). Lunch was a fairly descent BBQ Turkey wrap, fries, and grapes. Dinner was spaghetti, which I ate with 2 of GT's BBall players. The food tastes interesting enough, but because the cafeteria is packed to capacity by the time you wait in line, the food is either gone or cold. Hopefully the kinks will work out in the days ahead. That or I am going to start eating at 5 o'clock on the dot. The evening involved talking with friends in front of Healy Lawn and the floor meeting. Strangely enough I discovered I am on a floor with almost all Sophomores. At 22, and legal, I felt a bit old! No offense to anyone out there! But it is one more reminder that I am in my senior year.

I am now writing this from a friend's dorm room that is a floor below mine. The others are busy focusing on the DNC convention in general and Biden's speech in particular. I must say that so far, he is a half way decent speaker. Additionally I thought that the end of Clinton's speech was half-way decent but not the best I've heard from him. Kerry's was not only only direct attack at McCaain but actually pretty funny, and Biden's is moving and I loved the Freudian slip. BTW Biden's youngest daughter (26 y.o.) is a Georgetown Alum, so we are all hoping for a visit to campus and speech closer to election day. Currently I listen with open ears but am actually already studying away at Chinese. I think I'll head to bed in the next hour. Hope you are all having a good day! See you tomorrow!

Back on the Hilltop!

I am no longer in China, no longer in Seattle, but find myself already back at Georgetown. Although the last three months of adventures were amazing and they did pass in the blink of an eye, I found that return to campus was very normal. Almost as if I never left. I am slowly settling in, reconnecting with friends, attending the welcome back barbecue and buying books. I am living back on campus this year, on the 5th floor of Copley Hall. The first official dorm built of campus and it is filled with nooks and crannies characteristic of the old Gothic style of architecture. The floor I am on is all double rooms and it is a girls only floor, though the building is co-ed, this should make for some interesting times this year.

I ate in the cafeteria for dinner tonight, which has received a complete make-over especially the menu. Hopefully this will make eating there much more interesting with more options, in previous years my main complaint has been that it gets boring pretty quickly. There is now a stir-fry area, home-cooking and carvery, deli & salad bar with fruit (on both floors), a make your own pasta station, in addition to the pasta and pizza bistro down stairs, there is also a diner with burgers fries and the like, and finally a dessert station with Hershey's ice cream and fro-yo. The decor has also changed and they painted a huge Georgetown mural on the top floor. They also switched out the big 14 person tables for table that hold approx 6 people so it is a much more laid back and intimate atmosphere, there is even a bar counter to sit at and booths and pub tables downstairs. The other big change has been to eliminate trays, they say it is for environmental reasons, but I also see it as decreasing the quantity of food taken (even though it is all you can eat-buffet style).

So that is the big news, well that and classes start tomorrow, it should be a laid back week seeing as I have only two classes and I am sure that not much more than receiving syllabi will occur. But it should be fun, plus I have already taken classes with 3 out of my 4 professors so I know a bit of what to expect and the final class is Chinese and that is pretty by the book. It should be an easier paced semester. Mondays I have 1 class, Tuesdays thru Thursday 2 classes, and Friday no class. On top of that I have my first class of the week at 2:15 in the afternoon and my last class ends on Thursday at 2:30. Oh the life of an upper classman! I am really looking forward to this semester.