damn. weirds me out every single time.
In other news, I went ice skating with a bunch of people for the first time in over a year. So much fun. But my gosh, my ankles hurt like a mofo after skating for approx 2.5 hrs. to be expanded upon later

miscommunications
Grr. As I continue to study for my spanish test on monday, I realize that I am having the most difficult time with this language. Taking that year off from spanish senior year really kicked my butt. I wish I could have started learning spanish earlier... or that God had given me the gift of being bilingual. I am just so friggen clueless. I think one of the problems is that I keep trying to direct translate things, which is not possible at all. I need to stop thinking in terms of english grammer, because it's screwing me up like no other. I really hope I do well on this next test. Actually let me change that. I really hope that can gain a good understanding of the language and become somewhat fluent. Many of you may wonder why I care so much about learning spanish. I've discussed this with some people, but for the uninformed, my dream is to go to Espana spring semester of my junior year. I fell in love with spain when I went in soph year, and after hearing rave reviews from people who took semesters there, I can't wait to go back. That should explain a lot. I know I know, work hard at it and you'll be fine. It's just that languages have never really been my thing though. Sigh... woe is me.

I seem to be a little down right now. I feel like I have a lot weighing on my mind. I'm really only pondering about issues related to school and friends, but there is a lot of, shall we say issues, concerning those two topics. I don't really even know what to say about them. It's all just a big bunch of mush swimming around in my mind. Let's attempt some poetry, shall we? Of course, I'm not original, so I'll just borrow ideas from one of the great masters.
Many roads diverged in a wood.
Some were beautiful and inviting,
some were dark and forboding.
Others were hidden to my eye due to the limits of my mind.
Not wanting to procede to the future, I turned around to delay the unevitable.
Looking back I saw that there were many roads that lead to this stop of my journy.
Many roads, not one.
Ahaha, who am I kidding? That was quite pathitic. ::continued:: I used to be a lot better of a poet. Some of the stuff I wrote in 7th and 8th grade was pretty good, well at least by my standards. Extreemly sad and somewhat disturving, but good none-the-less. To sum up, I'm having trouble making decisions in my life, but what else is new? I.. yeahhh...

thanksgivings
Now that thanksgiving is over and done with, I can stop and reflect on all of those things that I am thankful for. I find that it's good to stop and realize how good we all have it, and that writting it all out allows you to see how blessed you are in life.
I am thankful that I was able to wake up today in good health, and that I was able to stand up and see the glorious day. I am thankful for all of my old friends from home, we've been together through the good and through the bad. I'm thankful for my new friends at Tufts, they are all awsome and have made it my second home. I'm thankful for all of my "church" friends that have helped me grow in my faith over the past 5 or so years, I would be lost without you. I am thankful for my family, they love me so much and more than I can ever even imagine. I am thankful for all of my relatives; always there with hugs, good stories, and great food ;) I am thankful for all of that which I overlook... life could be a whole lot worse...
Reflecting on that, life really could be a whole lot worse. I feel like we as a society tend to take things for granted. I know that I do. I often gripe about really petty, day-to-day stuff, but really, things could be a lot worse. I could be paralyzed, my parents could be split-up, I could have to drop out of college because of financial issues, etc. etc. God has given us all so much... "When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent left, and could say, I used everything you gave me."
I realize that this post is somewhat incoherent, but when do I actually make sense anyway?

lost connections
Wow. After talking with some mutal friends, I got up the courage to email someone I haven't talked to in a while, and he actually emailed me back. Ha, I could of swore that he thought I was a biatch, but maybe that's just me being hyper-critical of myself again. It was really good to hear from him though. If I just left it at that, I would be a liar, however, some things are not fit to be discussed on public domain, therefore... you all shall be left hanging... yeayeah, I'm evil. I know.

"but hey, if yer a bitch at times.. yer a bitch, and you have to recognize it"
~ray

hehe, I love this kid :)

Home again
Well I'm home. Back in good 'ole New Jersey. :) Seriously though, it is nice to be back. It's nice to see old friends, and take a shower without wearing sandals ;) I will admit that I feel sorta out of it though. Mostly out of the loop. I guess this sorta relates to what I said on my last friday five about not keeping in touch with my friends as well as I wanted to. ::shrug::
Tonight I went out to Victor's with Fil and Billy (ahh, so nice to have real pizza again), and then we went to the pep-rally and bonfire. Then a bunch of us grabbed a snack and the Riverside Diner, the same place where we had breakfast at 3 am this summer after the meteor shower. Ahh, the memories ::grin:: After the snackage, we all went to Billy's for a bit, and then about 45 min later, whoever was left migrated over to Henry's to do the usual tv watching and pool playing. I definitely miss the car rides and chats with Nicks and Leigh, and the grooving with Fil and Laur, and the inherent illiness of all the guys. Sigh. This place definitely has a lot of bad memories, but the good ones out shine them all.

"Sometimes being a friend means mastering the art of timing. There is a time for silence. A time to let go and allow people to hurl themselves into their own destiny. And a time to prepare to pick up the pieces when it's all
over. "
~ Octavia Butler, science fiction writer

ahhh... church was so great tonight. :) the singing was really uplifting and energizing, which always makes me really happy and energetic. And laurie's sermon was really on target today. I can't remember everything that she even mentioned, but it seemed like she knew exactly what was on my mind...
:) God is great.

shameless plugs
Everyone mark December 7th down on your calander! There are two events going on at tufts that you just can't miss!
First: The Tufts University Chorale and The Tufts University Symphony will be performing Mozart's Requiem in Cohen Auditorium at 4pm. Great music and great performers! What could be better?
Second: The Tufts Ballroom Dance Team is hosting their second annual competition at Cousens Gym... the best part about it is that it's all day! (translation: you have no reason to miss it) But seriously, it'll be a lot of fun, come and support our amazing team! Haha, or you can come and see me in a sparkly dress! :)

Now for the dilema: I'm in both the chorale and I'm on the ballroom team. What am I going to do? I definitely can't miss the concert because Andy will have my head... But international latin is scheduled to start at 5, and the concert will definitely not be over by then. Argghh... and latin is my favvvvoorriitteeee.... I'll be missing samba and rumba... :( sniffsniff

Good friends are hard to come by. It's really nice when you've actually found one though.
~Me

good times at Good Times
Tonight (or rather last night), PSF had it's first outing to Good Time Emporium. I know that I had a lot of fun. We got there around 8ish (some by T, some by car), ate, and then proceded to play games and what not. Haha, man, I haven't been to an arcade in such a long time. For those jersey people, I would compare Good Time to Sportsworld, except Good Time is a little bit more geared towards adults. It has projector screen showing sports and pool table and a bar and all that jazz. It was so much fun to relax and just mess around though. Lets see... what games did I play.. skee-ball, a classic arcade game... tag-team simpsons, another classic... oo, we all raced eachother in driving games. Its always so much fun playing against people! But damn, I came in second both times! and always only by less than a second! Grrr... damn James! haha, it was sitll fun though :) I also played Area 51 with Dennis for a while, haha, we were pretty good, but man did my arms hurt after that. Haha, that just shows you how non-existant the muscles in my arms are. I also played (and beat) Kyle in air hockey, 7-5 baby! Haha... The highlight was definitely playing lasertron though. I haven't played in... Oh I can't even remember. We played 5 v. 5, girls v. guys. The guys won, but who had the highest score overall? ME!!! hehehe, boooyahhh... it was soooo much fun, too bad it's a little pricey. The last thing we did was play pool for about an hour, we all did okay, but man, am I out of practice. An awsome time over all, I'm definitely up for going back sometime :)

Friday Five
1. List five things you'd like to accomplish by the end of the year.

• Get nothing less than a B+ for spring semester
  
• Place in the top three for a standard dance
  
• Place in the top three for a latin dance
  
• Stop being a procrastinator... well, that won't happen, but at least have a better work ethic
  
• Be more steadfast in my faith
  

2. List five people you've lost contact with that you'd like to hear from again.
Strange, because I was actually planning to write a blog entry on this... anyway, I happened to see Rebecca today when I was about to go eat lunch today so we ate lunch together today... the point is that I've realized that I really haven't kept in touch with my friends from Teaneck. I talk to Asif, Leigh, etc. online occasionally, but not all that much. And we all know that I'm not a big phone person, even though I did call leigh once. I think that I was just so ready to leave Teaneck and get away from it all that I've been so caught up in everything Tufts... so that's my answer. I know it's not a list of five people, but I'd like to hear from all of my friends from my pre-Tufts life.
3. List five things you'd like to learn how to do.

• Play guitar
  
• Play piano... like really play piano, but I guess that just comes with practice
  
• Sky dive (does that count?)
  
• Drive stick shift
  
• Fly (as in fly a plane... but learning how to fly by myself would be cool too. apparently the trick is to fall and not worry about hitting the ground...)
  

4. List five things you'd do if you won the lottery (no limit).

• Pay for my entire college tuition
  
• Pay off the mortgage for my house
  
• Find good caretakers for my lolo and lola (Grandpa and Grandma)
  
• Go back home (as in to the Philippines)
  
• Get a new car for my sister and/or family... and get rid of our beat-up mini-van
  

5. List five things you do that help you relax.

• Listen to music
  
• Read
  
• Sleep
  
• Pray
  
• Sit outside marveling at the beauty of the world

I extremely dislike the fact that there are never enough words to truely describe how you are feeling. It's very... frusterating, to say the least. Moving along, we talked about parents (or we were supposed to talk about parents) and forgiveness this past wednesday at bible study. It was really, oh i don't know, i just really liked the discussion. (This is one of those times where there are not enough words). I realized that while forgiveness helps out the person who commited the wrong-doing, forgiveness really helps the person that is doing the forgiving. Until you accept what has happened and truely forgive the person, you will have something hanging over your head until that happens. It's sort of like you're carrying around a burden, and in a sense you are. A burden of resentment, of unhappiness... things that just eat away at you until you get rid of them. In truely forgiving them, you're also forgiving yourself, which i think is the most important thing. After all, they always say that you are your own worst critic...

Spring Planning
Comp 40 - Computer Architecture
Geo 02 - Environ. Geology w/ Lab
Phil 01 - Intro to Philosophy
Spn 02 - Elem. Spanish 2 w/ recitation
Psy 01 - Intro to psychology
Chamber Singers

ahhh... I love my schedule for next spring! My earliest classes are at 10:25 and 9:25, isn't that great?!? That's so much better compared to this semester where I have 8:25 class every semester. The only thing that sucks is my comp sci class which is from 6:50 to 8:05 pm on mondays and wednesdays... It's all good though... getting to sleep more makes up for it... hopefully I won't be as tired in the Spring, which would rock, ahh, anyways, I should probably start my work since I haven't done anything since my classes finished. Oh and that math test? completely horrible. but at least I can drop my lowest test grade. If I worked it out correctly. I only need to get a 75 on the midterm to get an 82 for the class... definitely doable... And I'm definitely going to study my arse off for the final so hopefully I can pull off a B+....

hehehe, I got bored. the result fits pretty well... except for me being a male, but I guess that's just the picture,...

The Rogue. Hardened, Dashing and a bit of a romantic, you've seen the underbelly of life. While not as bitter as some, you have a Darkside and accept it. It helps get you through the worst of times and helps you laugh and party when you can.
What is the Dominant Inner being within You?
brought to you by Quizilla

"If we all did the things we are capable of doing, we would literally astound ourselves."
~ Thomas A. Edison

I skipped both of my classes today to catch up on sleep and study for my math test. Bad me. I guess it's not to horrible actually though. I haven't missed at spanish class yet, and my comp sci class is only a lecture, so I can just get the notes from katie... On the flip side, I'm still pretty tired and I don't think I got a B or above on my test... I guess we'll just have to see tomorrow.

Brown Comp
Ahhh, today was so much fun! The annual Brown Ballroom Comp was at Mosely on the Charles in Dedham, MA from 7:45 to 8:30ish... I had two partners today, Andrew (latin) and Davit (standard). We danced okay today... not great though. I made semifinals for American Rumba and Tango, and quarterfinals for foxtrot... ::shrug:: not bad considering that we start with over 100 couples per dance for newcomers....
But ooooo!!! Nic and Steph won first place in the Open Latin 5-dance category! They were so amazingly awsome! Oh man, all I could was sit there and stare, they were so incredibly amazing! haha, I wish I could be them :) When they were annoucing the results we were all listening for their number, and when their number wasn't announced for the 2nd place winners we all exploded into cheers =) it was so cool! Haha, Jumbo pride! aww, it was so cute though, they got all teary eyed. I love ballroom, its so awsome :) New partners on tuesday though! we'll see how that goes...

I'm going to have to dance for 12 hours tomorrow on only 3.5 hours of sleep.... Woe is me. or actually, stupid is me.

ahhh!!! so hyper!!! I want to go out and do something!!! Why are monica and julie being such poop heads?!? Gahhh!!!! Clubbing!!! clubbing sounds good!!! eeeeeeeee

Firday Five
1. Using one adjective, describe your current living space.
Cozy.
2. Using two adjectives, describe your current employer.
---, ---
3. Using three adjectives, describe your favorite hobby/pasttime.
Fun, energetic, the best
4. Using four adjectives, describe your typical day.
Tired, happy, lazy, fun
5. Using five adjectives, describe your ideal life.
Spiritual, fun, helpful, loving, complete
*as you can see, I never really paid attention in school when we went over grammer and what not, so some of my words are probably not really adjectives... or in just saying that I further revealed my stupidity :)

New beginnings
Tonight was my first concert as a member of the Tufts University Chamber Singers. I'll admit that we did mess up a few times, or at least I know that I did, but I think we still did really well overall. I feel sorta bad that I was coughing so much during the concert, but I couldn't help it... Haha, it's alsosorta funny how I stand to the extreme left in the group, which means that everyone is standing on my bad side... haha, oh well. I can still hear them all relatively well. I just hope that I was in tune with everyone else. Many, many thanks to everyone that came, especially since sacred music isn't all that popular nowadays. But really, it means a lot to me that you guys showed up :) The concert next semester should be a lot more fun... I think we're going to do more contemporary music like Gershwin (or at least that's what Andy said). you all should definitely come to that concert :)

I love the way how a good sleep can cure you of anything. Despite all of my unneccesay worrying last night, I woke up feeling completely relaxed. The funny thing is that I didn't even get that good of a sleep. only 5-and-a-half hours. As I was telling julie this morning over brunch, I have a problem oh letting go. While I have problems relinquishing control in certain aspects of my life, I think my major problem is that I dwell on things to much. To sum it up, I think I'll paraphrase the prayer at the end of Compline that Maya and I love so much:
...What is done is done.
What is not done is not done.
Let it be...

Letting go
Let go and let God... it's an expression used often among Christian circles. I know that I've used it often since I became active in my faith. I believe that if you give everything up in your life to God, then He'll make everything be okay. Well... maybe not okay instantaneously, but okay in the long run. If we stop trying to control every aspect of our lives and just remember that God is looking out for us, we'll all be a lot happier and less stressed... To bad I'm not good at relinqueshing control in my life. I mean, I can in certain matters... but in others I find it really hard. While taking my shower (thats where all the best thinking occurs) I realized that if I just let go a little more and trust God... that I would be a lot happier.
I think right now I really need to relinquish control in my love life... haha, or actually, my non-existant love life. That's what I'm fighting God about... the lack of a significant other in my life. Or I don't know if I'm really fighting it... I think I'm just trying to force the issue. Oh I don't know, this is all comming out wrong.
Okay... I think I've summed up my thoughts... here goes. I need to stop acting like an immature stupid twit when I'm around people that I like. Now I'm not bad as some people I know, but sometimes I feel like I try to be a little bit 'cooler' when I'm around specific people to be impressive. Which is very not cool. When I do that I'm being the biggest hypocrite ever. And its frusterating as all hell. This is what I need to let go of.

bugger... literaly
blech, I have a fever or 100.4... I blame Vanessa and James. :) naw, just kidding. I'm sure hanging out with two sick people for an entire weekend was not conducive to good health though... nor running around in the freezing cold. ah well, I'm a sucker for punishment.
*you know you like my use of british slang...

God's time (completed)
Ahhh, everything is so great, dontchya think? This weekend I went on the annual fall PSF retreat to Toah Nippi (sp?). ::warm sigh:: it was so incredibly great. We got to the place around 8:30 and proceeded to settle in. I can't remember the exact details of the night, but we played a few icebreaker type games, had a Compline service, chatted and just hung out. Haha, my car also stayed up really late and played a practical joke on one of the other cars... nothing malicious, we just led them on a little scavanger hunt to find some things that we "borrowed." :) haha, speaking of which, the other car pranked us back by prancing about in some underwear that they borrowed from us. Ahaha, very stunning james and kathrine ;) Oh, we also played a bit of late night frisbee in the freezing cold weather. Let me tell you, frisbee at night with poor lighting is not a very good idea. On saturday we all slept in (well except for Katie who is crazy and went running) and had a late breakfast consisting of eggs and pancakes prepared by stacy and katie. James and I also took our turns at pancake flipping though. Haha, James made the mother of all pancakes, ::grin:: it was great! After breakfast, the adult leaders gave some testimonies about discernement in their lives. After we broke up into pair to do a little one-on-one discerning. Oh, if you hadn't noticed, discernment was the theme of the retreat this weekend. Summarized really poorly, discernment is a process in which you make decisions through prayer and talking about it with other people. The one-on-one was really nice. I got to talk about some stuff that has been bothering me and get feedback on it. It's nice to know that I'm not the only one with "problems." After we all got back from our little discussions we had a lunch of sandwiches and then we had the next few hours to do whatever we wanted. For a while Vanessa, Seth, Dennis, Matt, James and I played Ultimate frisbee. Then liz joined us a little while later and we played touch football. All of these games didn't last too long, due to the freezing cold, so James and Matt headed back to the house while Vanessa, Liz, and I went to the main lodge to play a little piano and sing. We quickly found out that the piano was horribly out of tune, so we went to one of the other small lodges and sat an talked for.. oh I have no idea how long. One of the things about the retreat was that no one had any watches or clocks. The idea was that by not knowing what time it was, we'd be a lot more relaxed... and it was true. It was so nice to just not worry about a schedule or anything like that and just play it by ear. MMmmm :) Anyway, Dennis, Laurie, and Seth joined us at the lodge and we all chatted about PSF and various issues. it was quite productive. After a long while, we decided we should go back to our little house and get started on our dinner, which we did. We made a bunch of pizzas from toppings and cheeeseee and sause and bobeli crusts.... it was so yummy... haha. One of my wonderful quote of the weekend: "Wow. This knife is really dull." I know it doesn't make sense, but that's why its an inside joke. ::big grin:: speaking of which, there were some fabulous quotes that came about this weekend, but those shall be shared at a later time :) After dinner we broke up into small groups again and had a larger talk about discernment. I really liked all the talks that we had this weekend... it helped me think a lot of things through and just de-stress in general... we relaxed for a few hours after the last small group. we just spent the time singing and chatting and we kept going outside to watch the lunar eclipse. My gosh, it was so incredibly beautiful. Since we were out in the sticks you could see the night sky so well and it was absoultely breath-taking. aaaa... To me that kind of beauty just reaffirms the existance of God to me. Later on that night we played a huge game of Scattegories which was a lot of fun... even though some people cheat (coughcoughVanessa). Overall, it was a great time of fellowship, relaxing, and strengthing our faith... I can't wait till the spring :)

a week's long reflection
Hmm... I seem to not be posting as much anymore... I think it's because I don't think anything is really worth writing about. Just the same old same old. Ahh.. I do have a few rants though (haha, always negative, aren't I?)...
1) TAs: you are getting paid to help us, so when it's your turn to be on duty (especially on the night a project is due) please be there! or at least tell us you're not comming or something. grrr.. its my fault for not finishing the project earlier, but still!
2) there is no reason to tromp up the stairs and around the hallway at friggen 2 o'clock in the morning... nor is is neccesary to play your music so loudly at 1:30 in the morning that we can hear you a floor below
3) racism, etc. is really stupid. you're in the 21st century now. grow up and stop being dumb-asses

Think that's it for now. But lets end on a good note, shall we? PSF if going on a retreat this weekend to New Hampshire and I'm really psyched for it. That is one thing I'll definitely tell you all about when I get back.. :)

for all you comp sci persons: A draw back to coding in emacs or vi is that you get so used to pressing delete inplace of backspace... so when you switch back, everything is screwy and vice versa... gaaahhhh... In other news, picking out classes for the spring semester is somewhat stressfull. I feel like I have to pick a major now so I can plan out all of my classes. Anu has her entire course schedule complete up to senior year... craziness I tell you, craziness... It just really bothers me that I have no idea what I want to major in right now. I was considering comp sci, but I'm definitely not getting an A in comp15 right now. I don't know... I feel like i don't have enough of a natural apptitude in the subject to major in it. And then what would I do with a major in comp sci? I could be a programmer, but do I really want to sit in front of a moniter for 8 hours a day or more? What are ya'll majoring in? can I steal yours?

mmm... nothing gets you in a better mood than listening to old Mariah Carey :D

Ahh... I had a fun night. I hung out with a bunch of psf-ers in jackson gym, just acting all silly and what not. We played some Ultimate (to which i sadly regret to say that the girls got their butts kicked), so knockout (I suck at basketball), and some scateggories... good times all around. I've decided that the psfers are a very cool bunch of people that are fun to hang out with. After I went to this party in Hillsides with monu and jules. Why can't I find more parties like that one? I really liked it because it wasn't about the drinking... it was about the dancing, which was awsome. And not the really nasty-hardcore-dancing. Dancing as in actually dancing. There was a good amount of hip-hop type stuff in there, but there was also a lot of latin dancing and some bhangra (sp?). Hahaha, I got to dancing meringue even though I think I'm not great at it. I had a lot of fun though. If I knew about parties like those every weekend, I'd be out all the time. Too bad a lot of college students just want to get drunk...