october 31

it's a muriel day. I'm wearing a black hoodie + scarf + day-old eyeliner also warm+unfashionable boots and you can only see ONE of my eyes because my ratty hair is like permanently flopped over the other one. I feel like I'm glaring at everyone and everything but it's really just that I'm exhausted. 

For some reason I also feel vaguely like I'm looming over everything. I think it's because the tiredness is making everything seem much more far away than usual? it's like. I feel taller because the ground looks farther away and also I feel heavier because I'm birbing EXHAUSTED. birb

 

standout costumes I've seen around campus today:

- cal kestis. the little droid hanging off his back and the coolest long red leather coat I have ever seen

- flynn rider. somehow instantly recognizable as such even though his clothes aren't particularly attention grabby (possibly it was the frying pan that clued me in)

-  there were others but I have been elbow deep in physics for the last hour and now I don't remember any of them

 

not much wind today though. blessing from heaven 

wonder if missing days will become a trend

 yeah i've been like kinda spotty but mainly because there wasn't ever anything to report? have a super quick buletted list of stuff before I go to bed at midnight

- halloween tomorrow. actually got a costume together which was nice. witch costume. took like five or six things I already owned and added a witch hat. boom, witch. looks nice. not sure if it counts as a costume when I already look like that a bunch of the time normally.

- lots of homework. very confused about physics. executive dysfunction is kicking my sorry behind. slightly going insane about maybe three or four different things at the same time which means that I'm not DOING anything about any of them. besides pacing and mentally screeching a lot.

- found some cool new music. 21 pilots, evanescance, linkin park. all the same kinda vibe and I think every single one of them made at least one song for the Twilight Soundtrack which might tell you something

- new hobby unlocked! find songs that say deep things and go, "that's a <character> song". Then listen to it over and over and imagine a little comic or animatic in your head with The Character to go along with the vibes of the song. Then get sad because you want to read the comic and it doesn't exist.

- ward trunk or treat today. not a lot of people, very very small. got a friend to come with me and we camped out in my car with bags of candy. not bad, though nothing CLOSE to the ward trunk or treat at home :(

FHE - crashed a friend's thing because my FHE group never does anything. Literally, not once have we met. Don't even know who the boys are. So I popped over to the apartments a street over and we played Exploding Kittens and ate donut holes. It was surprisingly really really fun. Board games, like D&D, are much more fun with the right group. Speaking of...

went to D&D right after that. D&D night was special today because it was midsemester and also Halloween. You get extra XP and some other rewards for coming. I dropped in halfway through but I had also been to that same DM's session last week so I basically knew what was up. It was a little meandery but the players were fun so the session was fun. I brought Stefan, my insecure but really big-hearted wild magic sorcerer. Also a tiefling. 

BYUI has a rule that you have to only play characters that are your gender, so Stefan got a little gender-flip and became Stalah. Played her exactly the same though.

 

and uhhh yeah. tomorrow I'm either going to lock in and do my homework or I am going to rot out and my brain will be a puddle on the floor by the end. time will tell.......... 

october 27

**** btw the capitalization of my posts is significant. usually if I'm tired I don't have the energy to capitalize, so I don't. Also generally stuff gets sloppier. Let it be known. I suppose someday maybe someone could go through all these and use the number of spelling mistakes as data to plot how good my mental health is

 

average monday. no no wait it wasn't even average! it was a really weird monday! but I've been locked in and very tired so it feels average

- made some really good art yesterday. basically briefly got possessed then woke up and was like what is all this i have made this is crazy (not really. art just puts me in the zone)

- got some yogurt and veggies and stuff. healthy food is healthy and I'm feeling better because I made myself slightly sick yesterday and it's good to not be sick

 

- it snowed?? it's not even November yet. wth. my friends assure me that this is normal, as are the basically gale-force winds

that exist all the time. then it hailed. now all the ground is covered in snow. or slush. wet slush. i'm like not a fan. snow and wet makes dressing well VERY HARD and it's not ok. that's like a good portion of my mental health right there

- shout out to tutoring. went to tutoring, motivated me to work for two whole hours on work. what the birb I just did work. i may yet graduate college folks

- current music: twilight soundtrack, 21 Pilots newest album, a few songs from Evanescance and Madilyn Mei

yes, that Twilight. I know what you're going to say HOWEVER the twilight movie aesthetic ie the music and visuals is like totally different from the rest of the franchise. it's just coniferous forest, driving alone on a winding road with mist and fog out, cloudy peaceful days... and like, vaguely old-fashioned vibes. you can like the aesthetic without liking anything else abt Twilight 

(i like the rest of twilight. but you shouldn't just ASSUME that because i like the music is all I'm saying)

  

blorbo ask link

found a cool OC ask list. posting it for people to use if they want

the list 

** better to message me not on this blog, as it doesn't really notify me when I get comments. putting the link here anyway just so it's available

feeling vaguely Type 1 today

(To clarify: DYT type 1 not diabetes)

what even is this

 

Woke up to pink light streaming through my window and this view. Stunning.

Very very weird dream. Ran into President Nelson at the grocery store. He gave me encouragement, don’t remember what just that he was very encouraging. Then Brother Holland from my old ward showed up and we were like, whoa small world! and Bro. Holland seems to know Pres. Nelson, they talked like they were friends. 

Bro. Holland suggested smth that Pres. Nelson needed to work on, and he seemed pleased by the advice. Then i looked outside and it was raining fish. This seemed odd, but neither of them seemed concerned, even when I also saw a bunch of whales migrating across the the sky. They were HUGE.

Weird dream part doux: Daniel and I trying to catch someone. A woman? A bratty kid? Not sure it kept changing. We cornered it in an abandoned house, it made a break for it. We ran but couldnt catch it, it ran across a field.  My mom pulled up in a car to corner it but it turned and ran down a dirt road towards a stream? Forest? Bog?

It didn’t know I was following and so it slowed down. I jumped from above and caught it after a bit of wrestling. Decided to keep it from escaping by forcing it to stand in the stream but the stream was much deeper than expected… and then I couldn’t pull it out so it started to drown.

Mom and Daniel pulled up and helped me drag it out of the water. Somehow the part of it we cared about separated from the body in the form of a highly visible rainbow fish (like in the picture book)

Of course we went after it. Followed it through a water-based parkour game in a sewer system. According to my dream, our quarry was following the plot of Finding Nemo somehow and we were just tracing its steps.

Got to the end, dumped out in the end goal. Look around and nearly everyone is human again and we’re in a shallow pool next to a beach. Calvin from Calvin and Hobbes, but 3D, is watching TV inside a little coconut hut. Our quarry is nowhere to be seen. 

Then I woke up. 

October 24

 - Craving sugar, found some sour gummy worms on my desk. Want to express appreciation for their valiant service -

- People are so creative. Sometimes they aren’t but there is so much beautiful art and writing and innovation in fandoms and it blows me away.

- Physics lowkey stinks. That is all.

- really didn’t understand how to do smth in a homework problem. went to tutoring. Tutor explained it so I understood and could do it. I am not in fact a hopeless case 🤯

international old movie gets shown every week, the sort that are ✨cinematic masterpieces✨ or whatever. It was free, it sounded cool so I went. Was surprised by how much it would just reference socially taboo stuff offhand. 

There was a whole scene in a train compartment where two gentlemen were discussing women’s underwear?? And the guy straight up took out his suitcase and started showing off the different types of bras he brought along. I’m sorry??

Police in the UK look really cool though. Long coats. Honestly, EVERYONE looks amazing. We should bring that back, the expectation that we just wear suits, dresses, coats, hats all the time and change them for the occasion… everyone goes around looking so sloppy now..

october 23

 today was a poncho day and boy am I glad I did that. feeling very witchy as Halloween gets closer, maybe I'll BE a witch~

(hm I would need a broom. broom and witch hat. where do I get those. everywhere that WOULD sell one around here is probably sold out by now..) update from later in the day I found some good stuff at walmart. that solves that 

Club and major fair. Got some candy (taffy, of course) and coconut soda which is a thing here. Also found some good info about different majors - I'm undecided soooo that's good. Clubs in college are called ~societies~ which seems unnecessarily pretentious to me but w/ever

Thursdays are soooo busy. but the weather is beautiful and I'm still managing to get homework done. Mental health wise it's been a good day.. bracing myself for the weekend which doesn't tend to go well. But my dance card is a lot fuller than usual for both Friday and Saturday, and I hope that will help.  

THRIVE talent show

 

The class I take to help with stress and anxiety had a variety show to ~feel accomplishment for stuff we’ve done~ because that’s good for mental health and stuff.

Anyway people could sign up individually but doing SOMETHING as an assigned small group was also required for everyone. My group made shortbread and whipped cream and strawberries and several other groups also made food for their talent, so we had quite a feast going on at the refreshments table.

Other talents included singalong guitar hymns and a guy who read us his Wild West short story. One group did a madlib that the audience created and then the group had to act it out with no prep time. It was HILARIOUS.

One girl showed off her photography, including pictures of goats which I appreciated because I’m currently going insane over Count Lucio.  Another guy shared stop motion Lego animation from his YouTube channel.

I was going to do walking around with my shoelaces untied and not tripping. That would be hard to show off though so then I was going to do digits of Pi. But the variety show went long, and I had to get to D&D night. Frankly, I think I got more accomplishment out of that anyway, because I finally created a character sheet and was able to play. 

I love my THRIVE class though. They’re a good group and the lessons are all super useful and practical. I’m definitely going to go again next semester.

spot the reference

All of these are from the art gallery set up in one of the fine arts buildings. All art is done by alumni. Usually I don't get The Feels from art but some of these were really touching

October 21

 - it is now cold enough to numb my fingers as I walk and coat the sidewalks in a thin layer of ice. I've heard the roads are REALLY bad in winter but nothing about the sidewalks. lovely

- taking a few days off from social media. HOLD ME TO THIS

- discovered that I can get myself to do homework if I buy food somewhere and work as I eat. Something about using the energy I WOULD have spent on making food to get something else productive done instead--

 - backgrounds are sooo hard. i can do characters well, poses okay. but backgrounds? shading? lighting? idk man

- related note, nothing like seeing a bunch of peoples art for the prompt IM working on to take the wind out of my sails... i mean good for them. it also stinks for me. These facts exist in tandem and I am ok with it 

 

October 20

 not gonna talk about what happened today. we went to bed at 2 am. moving on

october 19

 yeah we ain't sleeping any better but that's not yalls problem is it

- church meetings are at 9 which theoretically is fine to get to because my first class is ALSO at nine. In practice I am usually late but anyone who knows me well will not be surprised by that

- I always think it's raining when it's in my room. Then I realize it's just my roommate's fan rattling in a way that sounds like rain on the roof. I wouldn't even hear rain on the roof, there's an entire dorm room above me..

- still no FHE group or ministering assignment. But there have been several linger longers and this one was taco meat and chips. Chat I have not had tacos of any kind for like a month and it tasted SO GOOD. They had leftovers so they let me take home a big container of the meat. *happy little bird ruffle*

- met some people who also like art and also read serious literature (like call of cthulu, dracula, frankenstein, gilgamesh..) - good for them. One guy recommended the arthurian romances so I will at least try those. Might read another shakespeare play next, if I still have energy for it. Solid classical books are good for warding away brainrot, methinks~

- so cold now. Hate the wind. If not for the wind I would be FINE

- groceries are hard bro like wdym I need to stay in a budget get to the store often buy nutritious food AND make sure the nutritious food is the right food for a recipe? that feels needlessly complicated 

October 17

 cannot BELIEVE it’s Friday. It does not feel like a Friday fam

not getting enough sleep so I'm just kinda feeling steamrolled? or just like. slidey. attention slides. can't focus... 

 

 

That one dream from 10/16

Not sure why the quality is so cruddy. But there you have it.

October 16

 It is SO DARK at 7:10 am. I LIKE IT NOT

Least I got my trusty lil candle to light my desk. My built-in light is very bright - good most of the time, bad when I’m eepy and don’t want my eyes dying.

Weird dream. Lots of stuff I no longer remember but I was at a corn maze or smth? Some place with farm vibes where you have to find a certain thing or get out or - not sure. It’s something like that but I can’t quite put my finger on it. There was also a Starbucks. Two, I think. 

Somehow we were in the general store but much of it looked a lot like a normal grocery store? There was a sign with French or Mayasian or that vibe of language and I pointed out to Daniel that ees and be and several other Eddy-words were on it. So Eddy did his little explode-y thing and I woke up.

Other notes from the day

- AGH I still hate Spanish. There's a couple speaking Spanish behind me right now and it is getting on my nerves SO BAD. Some of my roommates speak an Asian language sometimes, and that doesn't bother me at all so it really is just Spanish. I dearly hope, if I get assigned a Spanish-speaking mission, that I will be able to get used to it quickly.

- lost my car keys. Then left both my pencils in the car. Took notes for my Religion in whiteboard marker, because I didn't have anything else to write with and my laptop hadn't been connected to the internet yet. wheee

- Don't realize how much I'm relying on connecting with people over the internet and text until suddenly those people aren't responding, and I'm going insane~ not their fault. I need some IRL friends eventually. Hate feeling like I'm bothering people and texting them more than they want to text back, but some of my friends won't text at all if I don't bother them...

- School is slipping. Less on top of things. Still managing fine, but late to nearly all my classes now. Feel bad for the professors that have to deal with that. Not sure if I'm ever going to get back to not being late, though. 

- my roommate showed me the movie Ever After and honestly to goodness it’s like Princess Bride but 3x better. Lovely movie, maybe even better than Pride and Prejudice? Only watched half so we’ll see if the next bit measures up but dude Prince Henry is uhhh.. very cool. Yeah.

 

 

Gloves

 

Dude, I just figured out that my pair of leather gloves is then enough to allow me to use my phone with them on. This is marvelous. I’m very pleased. That’s all.

October 15

 Lots of stuff today. Went to bed at 1 pm yesterday and midnight the day before. Clean check meant that I skipped half of one class to make sure I did my job right. Most of my roommates did not do their jobs, so we failed. I hope that does not mean that I will be fined.

Tablet and new phone arrived yesterday, set them up today. After setting up several devices prior to college, the process is starting to feel pretty familiar. Bit of a hairy moment when I thought I wasn't going to be able to transfer old phone data to the new phone but... it all worked out. I'm typing up this post on my laptop right now.

Rainy and cold out. Unlike several weeks before when I was trying to get out of the house as much as possible, after classes today I was just inside the whole day. Setting stuff up, but also occasionally getting distracted and scrolling. I estimate a pretty big portion of the day actually got eaten by Tumblr today. But it wasn't AS bad as it could have been. Most of what I was doing was checking up on mutuals (Tumblr friends/followers) and seeing some genuinely interesting OCs and stuff. There was less meaningless scrolling for the sake of scrolling than there could have been.

My tablet is going to replace my laptop which I dropped last week. It runs Windows and I can do everything on it that I did on my laptop. Hopefully, I will also be able to use it for art. And it has a pretty chunky case, which should hopefully protect it from inevitable drops.

Winter is approaching. I need to make sure I don't spend too much time indoors. Having a car is going to be very helpful, because I think there will be days when I am unwilling to walk but driving is ok. Also, I can camp out in my car and it's more comfy to sit there than my desk chair is. Maybe should get an exercise ball or something because the chair that comes with the room is MEGA uncomfortable for my back end.

Think everyone's kind of having a rough time right now. The people I know, I mean. I'm not doing great but I'm much better than I've been at other times in my life. That is useful for perspective. 

October 14

 - THRIVE wisdom of the day: figure out your values and align what you do with your free time to go with those values. Or at least do things that will help instead of making you feel worse. 

- the amount of dudes with excellent long hair!!!!! That’s it no further elaboration

New tech has arrived! Laptop broke last week, replacement Surface Pro is here but still yet to be set up.. the hope is that my case will be beefy enough to keep it protected for a LONG time.

It’s surprisingly hard to keep the fridge stocked. Cereal and crackers and such stick around for a whole, but I run out of milk and yogurt and eggs SO FAST. Thankfully, the grocery store is close. 

Clean check coming up. I have never vacuumed the inside of a couch before. Also never wiped down blinds. Many of my roommates seem to not be particularly interested in cleaning, but there is a sign up sheet and I think as long as I do my specific jobs, I won't be penalized for work that my roommates did not do.

 

 

Noticed people aren't checking this much. Maybe this isn't working. I like updating it, but I would like updating it a lot more if the people who said they wanted this blog actually read it... 

I’m a pancake dododooo

If Friday the 13th is bad Monday the 13th has GOT to be worse

 - did NOT sleep well. Need warmer blankets or warmer pajamas. Or maybe a space heater.

- study buddies are surprisingly helpful. exHAUSTED but met with a friend and somehow managed to get through most of my physics work

- discovered i really like mushrooms. like mushrooms + eggs + avocado is almost as good as my usual onions and eggs.

- first counseling appointment. she's cool but she also just told me to get more sleep, eat better, and exercise. which... fair. But not new information. I go to tutoring and they tell me to memorize more and practice more. I go to therapy and they tell me to go home and take care of myself better. Feels like there's not much point going for help when they'll just tell me things I already know. I know I need to do those things. But HOW? because what I'm doing right now clearly doesn't work.

- visited WINCO the other day and it is a magical place. Like Costco? but also there's an entire section of pay-by-weight. You can get cereal, animal crackers, pork rinds, red wheat kernals, huge chunks of chocolate. There are at least 10 different flavors of granola. Dog food... amazing place. Will return

I raided the RPG Convention dungeon and all I got were these lousy pictures

 

Well that’s not technically true actually. I also got these dice. $15 for three sets of itty bitty doldrums.

October 10

 very very busy today I am tired. went to mechanic, picked up the Wood. I missed my Queen so I shall subject you to it now~

 other highlights of the day that I do not currently have energy to summerize but will explain if asked:

- donated blood with Red Cross. Different from what I’m used to.

- bg3 with Daniel. Very fun. I’m very very fond already of both Tahlsan and Kaeorellos. Love them both, so pretty. Plus, cool backstory. 

- took a career skill test, meeting to discuss that is Monday so I will have more details then

- BYU spirit parade and torch ceremony. Fun but  not well organized. On the approach to the stadium it literally felt like I was abt to get my soul eaten by the Saja Boys

Also prompt game with my mom, we both write or draw for a prompt. Finally got to see her entry, surprised and delighted to find it was one of the crackiest stories I have read in a long time. It could have been an excellent picture book, or maybe a story for a long road trip 

mom if you read this let it be known I think you should tell that story in the car. Or write up your other stories! Bonus if I get to illustrate them.

More photos, will explain if asked

 

October 9

-  A guy in my Greek class always has really on-point fashion. He just said that he always dresses like he’s on a date, because every day is a date with destiny. That’s deep and I heartily agree with the sentiment. 

-  I really enjoy cooking veggies in a pan and then eating them fresh. So far I have cooked and liked broccoli, mushrooms, asparagus, and peppers. Versatile and easy to make something yummy without a recipe. I think I will try squash next.

✨ Nutrition factoid ✨ of the day (brought to you by a free nutrition workshop I attended): It’s not just about balancing your fruits, veggies, grains, proteins and dairy. There’s another factor to consider which is macronutrients. You need carbs, protein, fats and water for your body to do what it needs to do and stay energized. Different diets will use different ratios but 50-30-20 for carbs fats and protein is standard.

October 8

Every time I change pants, I have to dig through all the pockets to make sure I’m not leaving anything in them. Sometimes I’ll be like huh where did my pocket knife go?? And it’ll be in the pockets of yesterday’s jeans. But keeping stuff in pockets is usually convenient so I continue to do it.

Spirit week: there is always tents and games set up in the middle of campus. Today they had donuts for anyone wearing blue and pumpkin spice tootsie rolls. Can’t vouch for the donuts as I did not take one but the tootsie roll was pretty good (to be fair: I am biased. I LOVE tootsie rolls)

Grocery shopping today for the makings of sandwiches and wraps. Hard to stay focused. Planning to try bringing a shopping list in the future.

People are weirdly obsessed with huckleberry here. There’s huckleberry taffy at the store and huckleberry froyo at Kiwi Loco, which is the frozen yogurt place here. I went there today with someone in my FSY company and I also went a week ago to cash in a free froyo coupon I got at a fair. The veredict: not bad at all! They have good flavors and the flavors rotate so that even only a week later there were a few different ones. The froyo is also very cheap - less than a dollar per ounce. That really works well for me because I can try a lot of different flavors AND control the portion size (unlike a traditional ice cream shop like Kimball’s,  which gives you so much of only one flavor that I’m sick of it by the end). They even had a flavor for the Mexican coconut drink - starts with an ‘h’ but I don’t remember exactly what it was called.

Pictures: 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Construction is so common here. Massachusetts is hard to get around because the roads are so bad. Here the roads are better, but half of them are also blocked off for construction. So... not sure that that's any better.

October 7

Some days I feel like dressing up and get an absolutely banger outfit or whatever. Today’s vibe is walking from physics to Greek wearing a puffy coat over a dirty hoodie over my pajamas. I’m eating Greek yogurt and apples out of a container with a pocket knife. My wrists look real messed up because I tested lipstick on them and couldn’t get it off afterward.

So that’s me but I AM caught up with schoolwork. And I bought lotion yesterday, so my feet are nice and moisturized.

Other stuff from today:

- Apartment is getting incredibly cold. I hope we have heating. In the meantime I am very grateful for the big fluffy blanket I brought.

- Instead of devotional, we watched President Nelson’s funeral. It was inspiring to hear that he treated his family so well in addition to being a good leader.

- There was free ice cream for everyone afterward. Everyone crowded into the HUGE indoor basketball court where they had tables set up around the room for flavors like “Hinckley Huckleberry” and “Meredith Mint Cookie”.

- I am. SO TIRED. Been drooping through all my classes. I did make some eggs with mushrooms and broccoli which is neat. I’m working on putting more veggies and protein in my diet.

- there are spirit events every day. I don’t think I’m going to make it to most of them. But I am trying. Getting out is good.

October 6

 - weather is colder. The window of the common room is ALWAYS OPEN for some reason. Heck if I know why but the place is always freezing. I’ve gotten out my hoodie to wear over my pajamas.

- one plus of the weather: the fashion of people around campus has improved. I’ve passed multiple people today with excellent sweaters as well as long coats and cardigans.

- Greek is ramping up. Lots of vocab to memorize. Class itself is very forgiving though and standards are low. We play a lot of Kahoot. Soon as I know more vocab I’m going to write fanfic in Greek just you watch.

- spent all of physics drawing. Did not pay attention to a single thing the teacher said. May come back to bite me at some point~

- the amount of soda shops around?? Crazy. People get soda like LHS students get Dunks. There are two places right nearby and both of them gave me coupons for soda. Unfortunately… I don’t like soda. Too bad they don’t have smoothies. Or juice, or smth.

- Spirit week this week! We’ll see how many events I get to because I will be busy. Today I went to a service activity and folded up BYUI box thing-ies that would be used in a drone show later in the week. The people I sat next to were very friendly and one of them was especially friendly, we exchanged contact info. Hopefully a potential friend. 

pineapples are relaxing to chop

  

 

I mean look at it

Can someone please explain to me why TWELVE DONUTS and one sushi roll are both $10??

 

It's actually quite sad

 

Greetings

 

 We got a blog now? We got a blog now.

 

    The plan is for this blog to be a place for me to keep y'all updated on the happenings in my life. The idea is that if I'm blogging here, I'm not texting five different people when you have stuff to do.

    The way this is going to work is as follows:  I post things. You guys check when you can. Then you interact with me by leaving comments or texting me. This is meant to facillitate me connecting with you guys, so if you ✨lurk✨ this blog ain't gonna last very long.

also PSA: I enjoy hearing from YOU LOVELY PEOPLE more than I enjoy telling you about MY day. So please, text me. Send pictures of stuff that's going on. It's birbing lonely over in Idaho and also I love you guys.