Hello 3rd year

View from atop the $600 apt.

Feeling: Refreshed
Current Love: American Boy - Estelle

Happy 2nd day of school. Despite my lack of enthusiasm for the beginning of school, I've felt pretty good being in classes again. I'm only taking 13 credit hours this semester, so my class load is pretty light (minus friday, which I have 4 classes and 1 lab. Totally lame, and I can't switch sections because everything else is full). I woke up monday morning around 10:30, my semi-usual time that I've gotten up for work over the past few weeks. I had a nice breakfast/lunch with my leftover pizza from La Scala, and headed out for my 11:30 class. I took the usual route to campus as I do for work, but this time around, there's a lot more people...a lot more. It felt weird, but at the same time I was happy to see the campus "alive" again. Seeing all the students reminded me of when I strolled around campus as a high school students. I felt pretty intimidated and out of place back then, wishing there weren't so many people...Funny.

ME323 went ok if not abit boring, but that's expected. My 2nd and last class of the day was MA304, which from the looks of it, should be fairly easy. After, I went to work for 2 hours and then to the pool with Kaveh, Bridgette, and Stephanie. We planned the very 1st Podka of the semester, set to be at my place. There wasn't a big attendance, and also lack of "po", and just a bit of "ka". Nevertheless, it was still fun, including the very random party venture into the $600 apt across the street.
I didn't get to bed till 3 or so and woke up with a slight headache. Luckily I only had 2 classes today, both in the same room: ME263 and ME365, my 2 lab courses for the semester. I suppose that's about it for now, hopefully the rest of the week won't be too bad.

Burning Down the House

Feeling:?
Current Love: None

4 more days until I began my junior year at Purdue. I'm not ready for school yet, deep down. I'm pretty content with my lifestyle at the moment: work, food, sleep, party, movie, etc. Looking through the textbooks for the semester gave me headaches. Maybe I'm a little scared, because I feel like I haven't learned as much I should have last semester, and that everything I learned have already disappeared out of my head. I guess we'll see how things go...
Being a Junior also feels weird. Am I already half way done with my BS degree? In a way, I'm still trying to figure out how everything I learned thus far will apply to my career later on. I'm hoping it'll all piece together soon..very soon.

In other news, I almost burned down my new apt the other day. What seemed to be another day of light lunch cooking turned into a flaming disaster. I was starting to make fried rice for lunch. I heated up the pan very hot and added the oil, unexpectedly, the oil set aflame and was burning like an unstoppable forest fire. I was shocked at first, because I've never had this happen before (granted I was using my roommate's skillet). I was hoping the oil would burn out in a few seconds, but that obviously wasn't going to happen. I panicked and tried to think of what to do. It crossed my mind to pour water over it, but I pictured the aftermath to be a disaster and am glad I didn't do it. I ended up finding a lid and covered up the flame. Soon it died down, but the entire apt was left in a smog of clouded black smoke. The fire detector went off, which didn't alleviate the situation very much. My roommate emerged from her room and was pretty confused. I didn't know she was home, which made the situation a little awkward for me. We did our best to ventilate the place, and after a few minutes the beeping finally stopped.
All the smoke vented after a few hours, and the metal/smoky smell finally went away later, leaving trails of black ashes from here and there. I realize now how people suffocate from fire smoke. Even though my apt wasn't blazing, it was still hard to breath under all the smoke.
I suppose in the end, I'm glad things didn't turned out any worse. I don't want to be homeless right before school starts, plus, I'm taking quite a liking to that little building I call home now.

Breeze from the underpath

Serene Wabash.

Feeling: Tipsy
Current Love: None

Stealing internets from Vienna, that's what I do after the fall of web2.0 and tonnny. I'm kind of stuck in limbo right now. Most of my stuff are already moved to my new apt, but I can't live there quite yet b/c I'm still waiting for my bed to arrive, which hopefully will tomorrow. Life feels weird without internet, but thank god for free wifi.
Today was my 2nd day of training at La Scala. Things were definitely slower today (for the better), and I got out early too, around 9:30. My trainer, Ryan, was really nice and cool, and we ended up chatting for awhile during down time. She even gave me a $3 tip at the end of the night for helping her out. woot, my first tip.
I'm pretty comfortable with serving, but I'm still shaky about the menu. I'm really scared that someone's going to order something, and I'll be clueless as to what it was. Too much fancy Italian words.
The wine list doesn't worry me as much surprisingly. I'm pretty confident that most people know what they want. plus I know at least the basics to make me sound smart even if I don't know what I'm talking about.
My manager already scheduled me to work next thurs. I had no idea until I looked at the time table. I think I'll be ready by then and start pulling in cash.
I'll take that back. There's not really a cash register at the retaurant. The owner has some weird ordeal with cashing at the end of the night. Ryan tried to explain it to me, but I only somewhat understood. But the bottom line is, I don't really get tip money each night, I have to wait for the owner to write a check every week. Bummers.

Today's weather was really nice, which made the walk back to the west side fairly enjoyable. I sat on the pedestrian bridge for a while; took in the scene and lit up a smoke.
Working late nights kind of makes me wish I can go out to the bars. It sounds great to just get a drink or two after work.

"Vodka vodka bomb bomb!"

Speaking of drinking, Mike had a little shin din at his place this past tues. My new roommate Christine and her friends came over, and the night resulted in beer pong and soju/vodka bombs. We were all pretty inebriated by the end of the night, and somehow what's left of the party ended up at my sparsely furnished new apt. We sat out/laid out in the living room, talked and played truth or dare. The next thing I know, I woke up in the morning to my alarm, passed out on the floor. I'm not sure how it happened, but it did. I wasn't feeling the greatest, so I called work and said I wasn't coming. But the good news was that a few hours later, I got the call from La Scala--- thus began my life as a waitress.

One job and another

Feeling: Clumsy
Current Love:Great DJ (Calvin Harris Remix) - The Ting Tings

Today has not been a good day for work. Although the sun is blooming outside, I feel rather tired even after 7 hours of sleep. I keeping on messing up at work. Nothing major, but just little things that makes me feel like I'm totally off today.

But in better news, I got hired at La Scala! I put in an application near the beginning of summer, but they said they were full staffed at the moment and may call back later in the summer. I wasn't too hopeful, so I was pretty surprised to have received a call last week for an interview....which I rocked. I came out feeling great, but I wasn't sure if I would get hired based on the fact that I have no serving experience.
Alas, I guess the manager liked me.
Yesterday was my first day of training. I went in during dinner shift and helped set up the tables for a bit. Everything started out pretty slow, and I was just observing, making salads, setting bread, etc. Things got busy around 7 when the 30 some old people came for a surprise party. My trainer commented that it was a really busy Tuesday even for a party, so it was kind of a bad day for training. I was pretty tired at the end even though I didn't do that much, but hopefully things won't feel so hectic once I get a handle of things.
Carrying a tray for the first time was also scary. I definitely spilled this one guys soup all over the saucer, but hopefully he didn't mind too much.
One thing that happened, which I didn't witness but heard, was about this couple that was dinning. The guy just left without saying anything, so the girl had to pay and was crying by the table. Odd.
The restaurant normally closes at 9, but I didn't get out till 10:30 or so. I was planning on eating dinner at Panera on my walk back, but I had to resort to eating ramen at home.

Salty waters

DSC00882a, originally uploaded by Lainii.

where I want to be.

Welcome to your new home

I moved into my new apt today (partially) and found this lovely welcoming present. Apart from that, a box of ramen.
I'm in love.