We're getting a new dishwasher!

The full story: We were having some issues getting the thermostat to work, so my roommate called in the maintenance guy. He fixed the thermostat temporarily, and will replace it completely when he comes to replace the dishwasher. He said they're both just very old, and need to be updated (which we fully agreed with like springy little bobble heads). He also got the heat working; the pilot light just needed to be lit. So now we have heat... you know, now that winter is basically over...

And just for laughs, I think you guys should know that when the maintenance man investigated why our dishwasher, or The Beast, as we like to call it, was making that god awful noise when it ran, he retrieved a tupperware that looked like a dinosaur had gnawed on it, and a porcelain teacup handle out of the main component where the washer spins. I'm pretty sure at that point he thought he had fixed it because he smiled, and said, "Well, that might be the problem..." He closed the mouth of The Beast once more, set it to run, and sure enough, it continued to make that wretched scraping noise. The smile came clean off his face and landed on ours. "That's a problem," he said. "This'll need to be replaced." I could have hugged him.

Other than the sparkling clean dishes now shining into our future, life has been all buttercups and dandelions again. Winter quarter is officially in full swing. I cut my hours drastically at work after learning my lesson that working full-time on top of full-time school is a death wish, so I'm only working two days (averaging about 15 hours). I'm in two higher level graphic design courses and Speech and Public Speaking online. Yes, you read that correctly: online. I'd always planned on putting the stupid class off until senior year in hopes that I'd be so dazzled by the light at the end of the tunnel that it would lighten the pain of taking the wretched, horrible, no good, really bad class. But scheduling made things difficult, and one way or another, the universe forced me into taking it this quarter. I only have to give two public speeches. I think I can handle that.


Under eighty days until I'm living in France. I still can't believe that sentence is fact, and not fantasy.

Sometimes, when I get really down, I get on the computer and watch old videos of all my friends together, or read e-Mails we sent back and forth while apart for long periods of time. It never fails to make me laugh, or at the very least, smile.

I want to share a little (and archive it in the process). Under the cut is summer 'letters' between my roommate (who was a few hundred miles away at camp at the time) and me (writing from a myriad of places, but mostly stuck in the SAV working). Enjoy. More importantly, laugh (because, yes, we really are that silly at twenty years old).

( NEW DISHWASHER, ANYONE? )

We’re moved. It took forever, and was completely exhausting, and we probably would have died in the street if not for the help of my parents because wow, did we have a lot of junk! Moving from the dorms last year was chaotic, yes, but not nearly as tiring because there was no furniture to move, unlike this time where we had beds and desks and chairs and couches and on and on and on.

I went through a series of paint colors and angry grumbling before I finally decided on one color to paint my room… and even then, I didn’t start liking it until almost three days after it was painted. But I think it came out very nice, all things considered. I painted the crown molding and the trim a clean white called ‘Waning Moon’ and the walls are a light shade of aqua that was much darker before I took a quart of the trim paint and dumped it in. I wish I would have enjoyed painting it more, I wanted it to be something special, and it kind of turned into a big, stressful mess, except for the night where Malia came to help and brought sangria and caught a midnight movie with us.

Outside of the move, finals are upon us again. Boo, hiss. Having a night job and getting final projects done is not a good combination, and I would be lying if I didn’t say I am seriously concerned for my final grades, and just how I am going to manage to complete all of this when I work every available night this weekend and next week. I am 50% caffeine, 50% bitter resentment at this point.

Emily’s currently in Alaska, Shannon’s in Italy, my parents are in tropical paradise, Bec just got back from New York City, Malia and Ben are going to South America in a few weeks, and Lillian leaves for North Carolina once school ends. And I am going to be here. Alone with Sirius. All summer. Until August.

My next update will be more thrilling than this, I promise.