Trick or Treat!

From the number of costumes on campus, you would think you just walked into an elementary school parade. Only at RIT will you see people going all out building robot costumes with working lights. Unfortunately, I didn't remember to bring my camera to class but maybe i'll get some pictures later tonight. Zach did run up and down the halls last week dressed as a tiger...



Guess who is officially working for admissions?? Had the interview yesterday (which I mentioned in my last post) and I got an email around 4:30 saying that I got the job! I'm going in on Monday to sign all of the paperwork and what not and I'll probably be starting for real on Tuesday. Basically the job will entail office work, sorting papers and what not, giving tours and hopefully blogging!

Somedays All I Do Is Watch the Sky

Snow, Snow, Snow! It has officially snowed in Rochester. No accumulation yet, but there were some definite flurries yesterday from about 3 am until 6 pm-- very pretty. Looking at the forecast, I think it has decided that it is not quite time for a heavy dump-- although a few hours north of us there was between 6 and 12 inches...

Anyway, let's see what's new... I don't think this week has been overly excited.. just a lot more of the usual homework, class, sleep, homework but that's not always a bad thing. This week has been oddly short, I can't believe that tomorrow is Friday! Next week is week ten-- the last week of the quarter. Let's just say I almost need my toes in order to count the number of things that I need to get done..

Wednesday morning Ashley and I got up around 9:30 and went to the SAU to make hundreds of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I got an email through habitat for humanity a while back that asked for volunteers so I decided to sign up for it. It was run by Hillel ( Jewish Community) and Foodlink. They had hundreds of boxes of bread, peanut butter and jelly and we got our nifty paper hats on and got to work spreading peanut butter. Channel 12 News from Rochester showed up and actually filmed us so we were on the news sometime.. but I never got a chance to see it. I talked with someone from Foodlink about what they do etc and she suggested that if I was interested to volunteer at their warehouse sometime.. so, I came home yesterday and emailed a guy at Foodlink and I'm going to be going in to volunteer on November 8th! Foodlink is not a soup kitchen or whatever you wanna call it.. it's a food distribution center which means they go to places like Wegmans and ask for food donations and then distribute that food out to local soup kitchens. That way there is one person, rather than 12 going to Wegmans for donations.

This morning I woke up bright and early at 6:30 am... haven't seen that hour on the front side of my day in a while. I had a 9 am job interview with admissions this morning so I got all bundled up in my coat and headed over there. Unlike most interviews, it was a group one so there were 4 people interviewing 5 applicants.. interesting. We're supposed to hear back either tonight or tomorrow so we'll see how that goes. If I do get the job, it would mean that I could blog for RIT that all of the perspective students read... I think that'd be pretty awesome because I blog already anyway =)

Well, I can't really promise to update much for the next week or so... but the last class of the quarter is on November 7th, so I'll have tons of time then!

As long as you're here... take a look at the survey question at the top right of the page... you can click to vote! I just picked this question because it seemed appropriate for the time of year but I will be putting other ones up eventually.. just thought I'd point it out!

Apples, Peppers and... Raw Fish Heads?

Went to the Public Market today with Ashley. It's about a 20 minute drive from campus in the heart --aka, sketchy part-- of downtown Rochester. Aside from the pouring rain and lack of parking spots it was pretty awesome and we definitely plan on going back. Everything there is ridiculously cheap yet really good looking... aside from the fish heads. They have it set up under two huge covered buildings and vendors line up with their food, clothing, etc. If I had more cash on me, I probably would have gotten more. I did get a whole basket of apples (about 10 of them) for 2 dollars, can't find that in a grocery store huh?? (Sorry Mom if I made you jealous =) ) Also got another winter hat for 5 bucks... it's super cute and I'd post a picture but i'm too lazy, maybe later! From the market we went to the marketplace mall which is about 5 minutes from campus. Ashley needed boots, jeans and some other stuff and I needed some stuff for my 3d design project. We also met up with Greg and John to look at halloween costumes but then decided we're not even going to be going to any parties on halloween so there's no point.




Just got back from dinner with Drake, Greg, John and Ash.. they're headed off to some haunted house later tonight (while I work on my stupid research paper) and then I think we're all meeting up to go to a comedian around 11. Tomorrow's forcast is: homework. Speaking of forecast... look at the next week. Yuck.

Twenty Days, Folks.

Thanksgiving is quickly approaching, faster than some of you may think... So watch out Maryland, here I come! 

Just finished up week eight. Went out to dinner with a group of friends.. It's kind of funny here.. once you have one deaf friend you start meeting them ALL because they are somehow all related, friends, or knew each other in some weird chain of knowing. After nine weeks of using sign language, I can definitely tell I'm getting better at it. I am by no means fluent.. in fact, far from it. But I manage to hold conversations and at least have some idea of what is going on. It's kind of cool really, I've just been thrown in an entire new language. I've gotten some comments like "wow, you're actually improving.." or "can you seriously understand what they're saying?". The way I see it, you won't learn something unless you try. Sure, it's a lot easier to pick up just by living around other deaf kids but you actually have to ... in mr. molfino's phrase, be "proactive"... I try to learn at least one new sign every day either by watching the interpreter in class/campus events, asking how to sign something or watching other people in the elevator or at dinner (no, it's not rude to watch other people sign.. i've asked.). 

Anyway, a bunch of people went out tonight to see Saw 5 because it came out. For one, i'm not a big fan of scary movies... although I don't really mind seeing the Saw movies. I just decided to be a good kid (or just really lame...) and stay here and knock out some of my homework so i'm not up until 3 am next week. Worked on my self-portrait for a few hours and now i'm switching gears and going to work on my research paper for writing. I think I pretty much have the entire library sitting on my nightstand right now... I'm working on a project for 3d and I checked 4 books out to use as a reference then I'm working on this research paper about how bikes are going to provide a sustainable future for our environment... so i cleared out the libraries section of books on bikes then I checked out a book on graphic design just because it had an awesome cover page. I do believe I will be living in the library this winter, they have comfy couches, tons of books and coffee! What more could you want? 

And the Beat Goes On....

Yeah, yeah... four updates in less than 24 hrs. At least, I think it's four. These past 24 hours have seriously felt like an eternity. I think that might have something to do with me staying up until 2:45 am, waking up at 5, attempting to register until 8:15, sleeping until 10, doing homework until 11:30, sitting in two lecture/critiques from noon until 5, doing homework until 7, eating dinner, watching the first game of the world series, hanging out with people, doing more homework, wandering around campus.. and the list goes on. Seriously, who knew you could fit so much in??

I didn't end up getting into the Vector Imaging class that I needed which has both pros and cons... Pros: no longer have class from 8am until 9 pm on Wednesdays. Cons: i'm going to have to end up taking it spring quarter, I'm only taking 12 credits right now, I wanted to take it... I tried applying for unmet needs but that didn't go so well. I'm currently in the process of trying to declare a minor so that I can take classes in that field...

(these are just two of the pictures I took tonight while messing around with the camera for a 3d design project. Ashley is rather cooperative while I mess around settings, Drake on the other hand moves around more than a 3 year old.. in fact, he moves around so much that I have to use the motion setting for him =) It took about 15 tries to get this one haha)

It's so hard to believe that it's already Thursday!! Where the heck did the week go??? Last time I checked it was Sunday morning and we were being idiots standing outside waiting for an event that had actually happened a day earlier. Only a week and 2 days before finals week and then we get to go home and eat mashed potatoes!! Mmmm.

You Don't Always Get What You Want...

FINALLY got into SIS after about an hour of clicking continuously. 

It's not really the schedule i'd hoped for, but it'll do. One of the courses I need to take is telling me that I'm not eligible so I went ahead and filed for unmet needs.. hopefully I'll get into that. 

Monday: 8-8:50 am Design Survey

   9-11:50am 3D Design

   2-4:50 pm 2D Design

Tuesday: 12-12:50 pm FYE

    2-4:50 pm Drawing

Wednesday: 8-8:50 am Design Survey
  9-11:50am 3D Design
  2-4:50 pm 2D Design

  6-8:50 pm Vector Img

Thursday: 2-4:50pm Drawing

Friday: No classes!!

So, Wednesdays are going to be slightly longer than necessary... 8 am until 9 pm... I'm really not sure how I'm going to handle this 8 am class. My guess is it will involve bucket loads of coffee and carrying a blanket to class..

Anyway, I'm going to go work on 2d for a little while and then go back to bed...

Registration Problems

Kay kids, this is going to be a freaking long morning. 

"All SIS sessions are currently in use. More sessions will become available as students complete their registration... blahblahblah" 

SIS opened at 6am... It's now 6:06 in the morning and the servers are already crashing. Lovely. I have a feeling i'm going to waste away the next 6 hours of my life refreshing this stupid page. 

It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time

Well, class registration starts in about 3 hours. Or we have to get up then anyway, but as you can see I haven't even gone to bed yet so it's going to be a rather short night =) We might actually never get around to the whole sleeping thing. Oh well. 

Today was disgusting. It was raining/freezing rain/snowing all day and really, really cold with big gusts of wind. Not that i'm complaining... but I did step in a giant puddle of cold water on the way back from my 6-9pm class. Yuck. Did some painting to finish up my 2d project, went to dinner with Drake at the dining commons and then we've mostly just been hanging around here being goofy on our floor. Ashley has officially gone insane tonight.. she's been dancing around and talking in weird accents all night =) 

Just went outside for the heck of it, I had to take a few pictures for my 3d class and then we just ran around and frolicked. 

We're done now..

Kay, guys.. that's enough. We'd like a break now...

As the quarter is winding down.. so are we. Tonight has shown that we're pretty much all ready for a 2 week breather. Not that everyone is sick of each other but it would be nice for a, you know, change of pace. I'm still really, really happy here but I'm looking forward to not having to deal with classes, homework, extra stress, etc. 

Guess it's bedtime now. 

comic from toothpastefordinner.com

Fall in Rochester

Well, the first prediction of snow for the year is for this week! (I'm not entirely sure if that is the appropriate moment to use a "!") According to our local weather station, there is supposed to be a "light snowfall" on Wednesday. Hard to believe that after looking at these pictures taken yesterday, huh? 

Anyways, for some reason Ashley and I stayed up until 4:45 am on Saturday night... not the best thinking on our part but we weren't tired and there was a police chase outside of our window, so we didn't want to miss that. Woke up at 8 in the morning to shower and get ready for our outing. Ash, Drake and I signed up to go to downtown Rochester to the public market they set up on weekends. The three of us were going to meet for breakfast at 9 and then the van was supposed to leave at 9;45 am. So, we show up at Gracie's at 9 and guess what? They were closed. I guess not one single person in a 14,000+ campus would want breakfast at this hour. We just decided we could wait until we got downtown and eat there so we chilled in Gracies (there were people sleeping in there?!??). 9:45 rolled around, no sign of anyone, then 10, 10:30. Seems a little odd because it was supposed to be a group of 15 or so. We had a brief moment of panic when Drake goes "uhm, guys is it day light savings??" but nope, not until November 2nd. We eventually just left and walked back to the dorms. Turns out it was on Saturday not Sunday. Yeah, we felt pretty stupid that out of three people we all managed to get the date wrong. Oops. 

Instead of going back to bed, Ash and I decided to run around and take pictures around campus because it was such a nice day. (Drake was grumpy and decided to go back to bed before lunch at 12:30) 

It's kind of nice to walk around early on a Sunday morning, there isn't anyone else around. Unfortunately it was Open House day so after about noon, the campus was swamped and getting a table for lunch was extremely difficult. 

Didn't really do much else yesterday other than homework. Oh, we did go with Drake, Greg and Zach to Wegman's just for the heck of it. Of course, yesterday was Sunday night football as well as one of the final games of the baseball season (what the heck has college done to me??! i've become a sports junkie) Just kidding =) I just pretend to watch.