Monday, September 29, 2008

Plans

So Mike and I took some photos this weekend, and a few of them turned out very well! We hope to use the iPhoto 'make a book' function with our good photos in it (eventually). Here are a few of my favourites, if you want to see the rest, visit: http://hiltzer.photoshop.com under Hamilton.







Thursday, September 25, 2008

The Anima

So I had a dream the other night and I was a creature called 'The Anima' (ah.nee.ma). I basically ended a war between two bases, modern tribes, whatever. One base was of industry, with weapons and walls and floors of rust colour steel. The other base was more magic based. The walls and floors were concrete here but there were random vines and streams. Water trickled down the walls too. So these two bases were at war, and I came into exsistence. The magic base took me to the industrial base where I was chained down. They said I was too dangerous to have around. I didn't understand why I was so dangerous though, or why I was there.
Anyway, from what I took from the dream, I developed the Anima as a creature. Here we go!


The Anima are solitary creatures, living in a space parallel to our world, with no life or colour. The Anima are attracted to magic, when a being in our world chooses to cast magic, it creates a small opening in the Anima's world. The Anima will seek out this magic opening as fast as they can, for when the spellcaster is finished with their spell, the opening closes instantly.

In my dream as an Anima, I crawled through a bright, green haze, and I could see the spellcaster ahead of me. I could see her begin to panic because I was coming to the real world and she couldn't cancel out her magic in time. I reached out and the pads of my fingers stuck to the thin barrier between reality, and the Anima's world. As the barrier broke, it made me think of melted seran wrap, the way it stuck to my fingers and stretched, creating circular holes.

Young Anima (who are lucky to make it) do not understand what they are to do when then enter reality. They simply know they are attracted to magic. As they become older, the craving for magic turns them from docile, to more aggressive creatures. They kill magic users in order to absorb the magic for themselves, which upon absorbing, will give them more power and help them grow.

The Anima come in many colours, but generally keep the same features such as big paw like feet, fur, and ribbed horns. Their fur matches the main colour of their skin, where the rest of the skin is always white, or a very washed out tone of their main colour.
For instance, I was an Anima in my dream, my fur and skin were close to royal blue, and the rest (white spots on the image above minus fur) was a very light blue.
The Anima's fur and skin is very delicate and soft, and their horns very durable. It explains why they are sold for so much money, ranging from $300, 000 - $500,000 USD for full pelts. Taxadermists have yet to perfect a way to preserve the Anima's form, as it deteriorates faster than normal biological creatures/beings.

Once they have reached adulthood, powerful Anima will seek each other out to mate. Female Anima's are much larger than males, and it is the females who fight for the right to mate.
For a size comparison, the young females would be the size of a Great Dane, and the adult females can get up to the size of an African Rhino (couldn't think of any other comparisons :P )
However, not many make it to reality, only about 15 a year, and half of them get slaughtered and sold for a high price.

Breeding can only happen in reality, and once the mating period of several weeks is over, the female will either ingest the dead or dying male who is too weak from mating (for extra energy). Using her own magic, she sucks herself back into the dark world from where they came.
She will give birth to a live litter of 2 - 4 younglings at around 6 months, and take care of them for several months. After the several months are over, the mother will pass away, leaving her youngsters to feed off her carcass and absorb the left over magic for themselves. This magic will allow them to grow a little more until they can find a magic portal.

Not many Anima's make it to reality, and because they are the only things living in their world, they feed on each other, though they do not need to feed often. They are solitary creatures that are constantly on the move in hopes of finding a magic portal.

Ms.McSneaks Weekend Sneakies

So Saturday dad came over to visit, so I got up early to get ready.
Though, while in the shower I was thinking how if dad took me home that evening, I could surprise mom, and then Mike the next day. So after getting ready, I nipped downstairs and long story short; got everything planned through Mike's mom.

Dad arrived and I made him breakfast, we socialized with my roomies and then headed out for a bit of exploring. We first headed down to the waterfront and found out there was a pathway. Finding parking was really difficult but eventually we did. Walked along there for a bit and found a nice bench to sit on and catch up. We went back to the house and picked up San and Jamie, then headed over to my school. Jamie was kind enough to show us around the animation department, and after San and her went to their extra life drawing class, I showed dad around the rest of the school; or, at least my wing. Afterwards dad and I explored the down town shops, which was pretty cool, a lot of paintings were for sale on the streets.
It was getting late and I still needed to hit up the LCBO so we headed on over there, picked up wine (for Mike and I's dinner), then nipped over to The Keg. I ordered a Keg Size prime rib and I fell in love, oooh my goodness it was so. good.
We enjoyed our yummy dinner, then started on our way back to Fergus. Dad was really tired so he simply dropped me off and headed back to his hotel. The next day he had the market so he needed to be up early.

So as I walked in the door, Sudzy typically came running up, though i'm sure he was expecting mom. Hi Sudzy! He instantly started purring before I even touched him, and for 40 minutes, I sat in front of the tv, petting my happy cat while watching some x-men cartoon, then Transformers animated came on. By the way, concerning the x-men cartoon I was watching, yeah, I was angry because the style in which they were drawn, emphasizes an impossible human form. No wonder self-esteem is so low.

It was getting closer to the time mom had to come home, so I hid in my sisters room. Mom came home, Sudzy went to see her, but then he stood in front of my sisters room because he knew I was in there. I was watching him from around the corner of the closet, and he kept looking back at my mom then back into the room. He then walked in and meowed at my feet.
I felt like he was trying to get my mom to come into the room to see me.
He shut up after two mews, mom walked by and went into my room for the computer. She failed to notice all my stuff in the corner by the closet, so I stalked down the hall, poked my head around the corner and smiled
“You weren’t lying when you said you were getting addicted to that computer.”
She just kinda stared at me for a second then said, “how did you get here??”

We had a long chit-chat and went to bed. She slept in for work, so I got up at 8, ate breakfast and watched a bit of tv. Mike’s mom picked me up at 9:30 and we headed over to the house. She walked in first, but I had to shut the door, which makes a bit of a click. Thankfully Mike didn’t think anything of it. So his mom went into the kitchen, they exchanged a few words, and when he wasn’t paying attention, I scratched his back a bit, He looked back and I ended up startling him because I was the last person he expected to be there. My legs were all shakey because I was so excited to see him.
Anyway we went to Church (new experience for me), I really enjoyed the experience and would totally go again! It was fun to see people I knew and get a bit more insight from something I really don’t know much about. I’ll admit I was a bit lost a few times but that’s ok. Afterwards Mike and I headed over to Walmart because we needed to pick up some stuff, plus to kill a bit of time. I had dinner at his place, we played Dutch Blitz (I will totally own you someday Mike… you watch) and my friend Dana picked us up. She goes to the same school as Mike, as well as my friend Cassidy, so I got to see them before I made her drop me off at home. Mom got off work and soon after she drove me home.
It was nice to surprise everyone, but I don’t think I would do it again if mom was working like she was.


Oh, and I have more art to share. I'll post it next week in a giant art poop. I want my painting back that I did this week, it friggen pwned (top in the class ya'll!).

And my xbox live group loves me. This all happened in a span of 8 seconds, and thats not even all the messages hahah. Thanks guys ^_^;




Oh! And we got our first official challenges!
Unfortunately I won't be able to play alongside the Crew but that's ok, i'll be recording the final scores here: X3F Wrecking Crew (I made the site for them). It will be under 'Challenges'.
I'm seeing Mike this weekend! I'm leaving Friday instead this time instead of the usual Saturday morning, so I hope it's all good.
I really need to get to bed.

- Laura

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Weekeeend

So Saturday dad came over to visit, so I got up early to get ready. Though, while in the shower I was thinking how if dad took me home that evening, I could surprise mom, and then Mike the next day. So after getting ready, I nipped downstairs and long story short; got everything planned through Mike's mom.
So dad arrived, I made him breakfast, we socialized with my roomies, then headed out for a bit of exploring. We first headed down to the water front and found out there was a pathway. Finding parking was really difficult but eventually we did. Walked along there for a bit and found a nice bench to sit on and catch up. We went back to the house and picked up San and Jamie, then headed over to my school.
Jamie was kind enough to show us around the animation department, and after San and her went to their extra life drawing class, I showed dad around the rest of the school. Or, at least my wing. After wards dad and I explored the down town shops, which was pretty cool, a lot of paintings were for sale on the streets.
It was getter later and I still needed to hit up the LCBO so we headed on over there, picked up wine (for Mike and I's dinner), then nipped over to The Keg. I ordered a Keg Size prime rib and I fell in love, oooh my goodness it was so. good.
We enjoyed our yummy dinner, then started on our way back to Fergus. Dad was really tired so he simply dropped me off and headed back to his hotel. The next day he had the market so he needed to be up early.

So as I walked in the door, Sudzy typically came running up, though i'm sure he was expecting mom. Hi Sudzy! He instantly started purring before I even touched him, and for 40 minutes, I sat infront of the tv, petting my happy cat while watching some xmen cartoon, then Transformers animated came on.
It was getting closer to the time mom had

Monday, September 15, 2008

Police Investigation

Ok well, first on Friday we had a model in our 3D class which is basically sculpting. We had to draw a profile view and frontal view, but she turned in her chair to face a different direction every 3 minutes. Needless to say, it was pretty annoying.
Then from our drawings we had to sculpt the side profile view, which I managed to do ok, though the nose is too big!



So then came Saturday and I was really excited because it was my turn to visit Mike! I hit up No Frills and picked up some goods. It was super humid but it was spitting a bit outside, which was really nice to keep me a bit cooled down. At about 8:10am, I got to the train station and my train was cancelled. They didn't tell me why, but they were providing GO buses to take us en route all the way to Hamilton.

While I was waiting for the bus, there was a guy who was on his phone saying there was a fatality on the tracks. I wasn't sure how to take that because he could have been speaking figuratively. When we finally reached Hamilton, I was the only one on the bus and I asked the bus driver why the trains were cancelled. She paused a bit and hummed and hawwed and finally said, "Lets just say there is a police investigation."

Fair enough.

ONWARD!

So Mike met me and we were happy happy! and then we walked to the next bus spot to be taken to his residence. Mike was telling me there was a lady in the bus station who was yelling the KKK stole her boots and there was a mass genocide against her race... she was also caucasian. White.
She was a bit crazy. Then she started saying, "You Canadians are so fucking stupid, don't even know where the pharmacy is!" and someone yelled out,
"If you don't like Canada, go back home you crazy bitch!"

So anyway, we arrived at residence, I signed in, and got to see his room. I really like it, it's cozy! Which, maybe he doesn't think its cozy, but I think it is. We chilled for a bit at first, then walked over to Walmart and got some stuff at the strip mall. Only minutes after we got home, it started to piss pour outside. We decided to have our pasta lunch with a rosemary bun thing with a fancy name that I bought at Artisano's.. phew run on sentance! : D

Mike showed me around his school and I got to see some of his classes. Over night we had Guru for the first time (it was good! though made us feel a bit sick), we watched the movie Postal (hilarious!), and watched lots of Code Monkeys. It was really fun!
I had a bit of difficulty falling asleep, mainly cause i'm not used to someone next to me, though I eventually fell asleep.

In the morning we lounged around in bed then had this chocolate chunk flakey thing cereal, it's made by presidents choice. It's ok, but I would never buy it again. At 6:05pm, we headed down to the local transit so I had lots of time to find my bus at the Hamilton Go Center. I miss him so much, and I woulda looked over and waved when I got in the bus, but it started moving sooner than I expected and nearly fell onto someone, hahah. Anyway, got home safely, walked home in the rain, and thought I got locked out the house but simply didn't push the door hard enough.

Anyway, today was my first life drawing session, yay!
and srsly, old people have odd shapes cause their skin sags down,
not just breasts but everything else too.















Friday, September 12, 2008

It Has Arrived!



Photoshop CS3 Extended! Mom brought it with her today and I was so excited! The only disappointment I had was; it was lacking that fresh smell. Like when you climb into a new car, or open a new book. Yea, a fail on that department.

So folks, when you buy any Adobe product, there is one important thing you have to remember...





DO IT! BECAUSE THEY TELL YOU TO!

It's super easy to set up though, only took me a few minutes. I'm lovin' it so far, loads up super fast, looks great. I was explaining to my sister I was using Photoshop Elements and it went something like this:

Laura
yea rly, but I am glad too. Was kinda crap working with elements, but it did the job I guess

Lindsay
elements whats that?

Laura
Photoshop Elements is like the difference between a baguette to a baguette with dressing, ham and fresh swiss cheese with a side of pasta salad

Lindsay
oh wow


True no? Photoshop users would agree!
And I have something to make you jealous. Ready?




Uh huh, giggity giggity aww riight.

- Laura

... I really need to go to bed

Thursday, September 11, 2008

Funnies

Do not punch your friends in the face, even if it makes you happy.

Never drink through your nose, that's a sure way to drown.

Never drive anywhere with a rabid wolverine in your pants.

If you get in an accident and not wearing a seat belt, try to block most the impact with your forehead.

What are germs? Germs are tiny tiny, little creatures, that want to kill you.

Even a tiny cut or scrape can be deadly, as soon as you're injured, immediatly cover the open wound with crazy glue.

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Line, Shape, Texture

Update: Got an A-
So the point of this project was just to familiarize us with line, shape, and texture. It's a design class, so with the stuff we've learned, we had to create a final composition. This is one of my final compositions, this one is more empty but I like the skull. In general it's supposed to be abstract and not have anything... I guess, 'familiar', but I wanted a skull and a sorta decay look to it so I hid the skull in a more stylized way.
The other one has far more detail and has a futuristic look to it, it would be the one I want to hand in. It'll just be harder to replicate from the rough draft because I have so much in it.
I'll post the other one when I finish it, I gotta do some other important homework but mom is visiting tomorrow night, and i'm not going to be around this weekend so I only have Friday night to finish Mondays homework, and Monday during the day to finish Tuesdays homework.
I'm not too worried about it : )

Oodles of Doodles

Art Poot! Plug yer nose!

...

..

*poooot*

These puppies were brewed up last week








... and this ones fresh!
As I suspected, class was boring today.
For two and a half hours I sat there with a sore back, attempting to amuse myself.

: )



- Fin.

Monday, September 8, 2008

School Again


After Mike left on Sunday, I plopped down and played some Castle Crashers and Halo 3 to keep my mind busy. I also finished the picture above! The knight is Mike, and the princess is me before my hair was lopped off for school.
I spoke to Mike on the phone Sunday night, he made it home alright and explained a bit more about the route i'll have to be taking on Saturday when I go to visit him.

Also! Oh! Okay, so I ordered Photoshop CS3 Extended from Sheridan's online store, Journey Ed or something. Well, everything was good until they said to me, oh you need to fax your proof of being enrolled and you only have 7 days to do it. I'm too lazy, and I don't want to run around for a fax machine before I was leaving for BC, so I was like screw it, i'll stick with Elements.

Well, two weeks later, this past Saturday actually, I get an e-mail from mom saying I received a package. What?

Yup, they sent it anyway. I don't mind, I only saved myself the trouble!


Soooo 6:20am wake up call this morning, and tomorrow too, but I like it because then I get off class at 11 and I get the rest of the day!

I went to my Line drawing class (the one I accidentally went to last Tuesday) today, which I was tempted to skip but then I thought, ehh maybe he will do things differently. Well... it was a waste of 2 hours, but I got out an hour early so that's not too bad.

I attempted to pick up OSAP, I had everything but a void cheque, which sucks, I need mulah! And I figured out how to opt out the mandatory health benefits through my school since I already have benefits. And cute Castle Crasher knights ftw.
I got new white paint too, aparently a lot of people got really watered down paint in their art fundies kits. Tomorrow I have a feeling is going to be brutally boring, I don't really like the teacher. He's slow, which we'll probably be thankful for later when we get into more difficult things, but right now... ugh
Next project; paint a colour wheel!

...

Soooo yeah. When I got home today I worked on a few things, then ended up going for a nap. I had to nap with my IKEA pillow beside me, otherwise the bed feels so empty with Mike gone. When I got up I started to work a bit on a commission n' what not. Not a whole not interesting.
I should go to bed soon, since, I want to be awake for my boring class tomorrow, hahah.

Night everyone!

The Weekend

So Friday's classes weren't so bad.
My first class, Imaging Systems, i'm a little worried about, mainly because it's kinda like drafting, very precise in it's shapes, very technical drawings. I don't like technical stuff because I like freedom in art, but this is stuff i'm going to need. If I become an animator, I need to have a wide variety in my art. After Imaging Systems is basically my hey play with clay!' class.
That's exciting actually, i'm looking forward to that!

The weekend was amazingly awesome because Mike came to visit! He was really shaken up by the transit system because he hates it, so we walked home and took some time to relax. Around lunch time we weren't really hungry because his nerves were still a bit shot and I had had a bit of a later breakfast, so in hopes of making ourselves hungry, we walked to my school. I showed him around a bit like the cafe, photography wing, looked at the displays, and showed him a life drawing class (not in progress). He seemed to really like the school, but there wasn't much else to see, so walking past residence, we headed over to Artisano, that bakery I was talking about!
When we got there I wasn't sure if he wanted to eat there but once we started to see things we liked it was ok. We decided to share a four cheese pizza, which it was really good! Though I had to eat it with a fork and knife, lets just say I wasn't a graceful eater that day.

After our filling lunch, we went back to my place and relaxed a bit more. Socialized with the roomies and were all giddy with each other. It had only been a week since I last saw Mike, but with school it felt like so much longer, and seeing him, the excitement was so much stronger.
I guess it's because we know we won't be able to see each other as much, and being at such a distance really makes our hearts grow fonder.

Well, after our little break, we decided to hit up the mall to kill some energy, maybe get us hungry for dinner. We went through The Bay and went into the main part of the mall. After going to HMV we were like, man, could totally go for an Orange Julius right now, so we went to the food court in search of it. We thought we found it, but when we rounded the bend, it was some different company, like, Jugo Juices or something like that, maybe Fruit Jugo. They claimed they would be better than Orange Julius (they never heard of it before though), so we were like hmmm well ok... they were definatly not as good as Orange Julius but it was still good!

We walked around a bit more though when the mall announced they would be closed in 10 minutes, we booked it back to the Bay. We looked at these nice Bench sweaters I liked, but all of them were either $85 or $95 and I was like. No.

So then we headed to the upper levels, as we were walking towards the doors, Mike stops and says "Laura... I just wanna see."
I turn around and he's standing in front of the children's section where winter coats were on display. I kinda looked at him, then the coats, then back at him. I sighed, with a smirk tugging at the corner of my lip "oooh fine, ok."
The result?



LAWL

We headed back home once they announced the mall was closed (didn't want locked in!), and started to make dinner which was a chicken pasta dinner with sour dough bread from the bakery. It was so good! After washin' up our dishes, we headed upstairs and took it easy. When we finally headed to bed, it was really hot but managed to sleep ok. I kept waking up early in the morning and going back to sleep, I really need new blinds or a thick curtain cause the blinds don't shut all the way so it's bright in the room around 6 in the morning.

Mike and I lazed about in the bed till 11 'cause we wanted to just totally take a relaxing day, plus it was raining. We had our showers, then headed downstairs. I made him french toast for brekky because he said he hasn't had it in a long time.
The first two french toasts were failures because they kept sticking to the pan (it's an old pan), but then that caused the last two to fail because burnt bits were getting stuck to them.
Either way, they were kinda good, I want to use different bread next time.

After breakfast we went upstairs again, we were both really tired and at one point I thought he was sleeping (though he wasn't really) so I fell asleep. Aparently I was in such a deep sleep, Mike ran his fingers through my hair a couple times and I didn't wake up. Anyway, we had to leave at 3:50 to catch the 4:20 train. We were almost late, though Mike got on his train just in time. I waited to see him off, but suddenly he jumped off. He wasn't sure he was on the right train, we asked someone to get reassured, but then the train left on him. Turns out it was the right bus, but I wasn't complaining. I know he wanted to get home to get it out the way (not because he wanted to leave me), but I was glad to wait with him for another hour. Plus I managed to cheer him up because he was bummed about it.

His train arrived again, we said our goodbyes, and as the train pulled away, seeing him through the glass, leaving to go home was the hardest thing to watch. I turned away and had to hold back the tears because there were so many people, I didn't want people to watch me cry.

For all the times he'll be visiting me, and i'll be visiting him, I don't think i'll ever get used to watching him leave.

- Laura

Friday, September 5, 2008

Halo x Anime

So I randomly searched Spartans on Deviant Art, I was fully expecting the majority of deviations to be half naked men from 300, but I wanted to see if there were halo pics i've missed.
Thats when I came across this:




It's a good piece, don't get me wrong but honestly.
I feel like the realism related to Halo is down graded when I see this cross.

I can't see anyone fully understanding how I feel about this unless they've read the Halo 3 novels. You learn about brutality, sacrifice, heroism, innocence. You follow the Spartans lives, you follow the war in so much more detail, more than any video game could provide.

I'm sure there are many movies and tv shows done in anime style that tug at human emotions, but the difference is anime lacks the realism that Halo brings. To mix anime with Halo is almost confusing.

The art style of anime I find is very juvenile, which is another thing that could fall under the whole 'lacking realism'. I don't know, personally, I think no one should ever draw an anime x halo cross. I know i'll draw halo with anthro characters, but those are for silly fun with my friends.


I rest my case.

Thursday, September 4, 2008

Cool Beans




I got up early like I said I would, and Mike ended up sleeping in!
Hahah, that was totally cool with me though, I just showered and what not while I was waiting.

The days are still hot, and I still choose to wear pants because I shaved my legs and got severe razor burn and so many knicks it looks like I got a swarm of black flies in my pants. So, because I don't think that is something to show off; pants it is.

So it was English class today, more specifically Basic Communication Skills class. I was a little meh about it at first but it wasn't all too bad. The first two hours is a lecture, which will be brutal for me because I find it hard to focus when the teacher just talks and talks. I'll just have to take a lot of notes. So yes, 2 hours of lecture, then for the last hour we migrate to the 'E' wing and go to the computer lab. That's where we do our work online to have a try at whatever the teacher blabbed about for 2 hours.

We learned about a system today where we put in our student ID number and username, and we can access lectures online, see what other people are online with the same system. You can look at your assignment marks, n' probably so much more. Well, there's basically an msn function but it's a group. Our class got bored, and 12 of us were in there saying the most random things ever, it was quite amusing! There's also a whiteboard function in this chat thing so people are drawings faces, penises complete with hairy balls. There was African tribal faces, french artists smoking weed, Shoop Da Whoop (done by yours truley); you see this is what happens when a bored art class discovers the drawing function.

Everything went by pretty quick after that, I tagged along with a girl from my fundies class, and a guy tagged along with us. We went to 'The Book Store', which is basically the store with all text books and art supplies you could dream of. Some stuff in there, like Micron pens, are 2 bucks cheaper than their price in Fergus! I only picked up a folder with the different tabs and plastic seperators. I have a booklet full of lined paper for taking notes in English.

After the bookstore, we parted ways and headed home.

Good news! Mike is coming over this weekend! I am going to make a chicken dinner, hopefully it turns out alright. For lunch on either Saturday or Sunday, I want to take him to this new bakery that's opened up near me. Home made pizza there, breads, panini's, sandwiches, salads etc.
Smells so good in there, it's got comfy chairs and the price is right. It's only about a 8 minute walk from my place, which is nice, and it's healthy eats which appeals to the both of us.

While I checked that bakery out today (i'll get the name of it if we go), I found out there was an art store right next door (Curry's I think). I went over and bought two art pencils, a small sketchbook, lineart pen, and other various items for Mike. He can't play Steam in residence because they have it blocked. He also can't play xbox live, he can play local, but not live; again, because it's blocked.

I figured maybe he could doodle if he ever got bored, I mean, if he doesn't use it, it doesn't bother me any but at least he has it.

From the art store I went home, crossed on the wrong side of the intersection but didn't get run over. I attempted to do my homework but my white acrylic paint was way too watery so i'm going to buy a new one tomorrow. Then I attempted to build this two drawer thing on the end of my bed. It looks ok, but you can tell something isn't right.
Oh well! It works, I put all my art supplies in there from my art fundies kit (my shoulders still hurt). I have a better idea what stuff I bring for what class for next week so I won't kill my back.
Plus I have my pink, spiffy backpack!

I spoke to Mike on the phone for a bit, had a basic dinner, organised my room, played a bit of Castle Crashers, and now i'm playing Halo 3 with my Wreckin' Crew pals.
Tomorrow I have two three hour classes, i'm not looking forward to that... on a Friday! of all days! But I have Saturday to look forward to : )
Later!

<3

Getting Comfortable

So as I previously mentioned, my class didn't start until 3 today. A bit disappointing at first because you have most the day off and suddenly, school! It was a bit too early to call my love, Mike, and San was still home (don't like talking on the corded phone when people are home), so I decided to try the trial game of Castle Crashers. Absolutely amazing might I add. Mike came on soon after, and San left about 20 minutes later.

With the living room empty, I headed down and spoke to Mike for an hour. He was telling me he had nothing to do this coming weekend so he might visit! This made my day, no, my entire week that much more awesome knowing I might get to see him. There still is that chance he won't be able to, but we'll see. After getting off the phone I went up, played a bit of Halo 3 (kicked butt in Team SWAT), went for my shower and headed off to school.

I felt a bit better about having a later class soon after I arrived. My class is filled with some pretty sweet, friendly people so I felt at home. After class, I walked with a girl named Lisa (same girl who on day 1 went to the wrong class with me) to the hall that leads to residence. We parted our ways there, she went to residence, I continued on to get my Student ID card done up.

Only took about 3 minutes to get it done, though my picture is horrible! I thought my lips were resting in a comfortable, smirking sorta position... boy was I wrong.
They kinda just stick out, like when you hold a spoon under your nose using your lips; same idea, though not as exaggerated. I guess it could have been worse? Good thing is, i'm sure many students go through various stages of embarassing photos.

Anyway, I headed over to the Oakville Center after school and picked up 1400 microsoft points at EB Games, and also picked up a fan from Sears. Now the humid air in my room can be blown around! Yes!

I played more Castle Crashers, this time the full version, online with my X3F Wrecking Crew buddies (our halo 3 group... or, clan but less serious you could say). Mitch randomly came upstairs to see what I was up to, I think the room mates are warming up to me, then he saw my xbox and was really really happy. Now that I think about it, he was probably wondering who the heck I was talking to... Anyway, I told him he's welcome to play it whenever i'm not home, or even when I am home and not doing anything.

I went downstairs and made dinner, watched the end of the 6th Star Wars, then spoke to my mom on the phone. I went back upstairs for a bit because Jamie's parents arrived for a visit. I offered them some of my pop (cause I really shouldn't be drinking it), then unpacked my fan. I went back downstairs and dropped the box into the garage, but instead of retiring back to my room, I sat on the stairs and socialized. Soon after I sat in the living room with Jamie, Mitch, and San.

I don't really know how it started, but everyone started singing as San was playing the guitar. I attempted to play the didjeridoo (haven't played for 2 years), then Jamie taught me a bit about how to play the bongo. That was fun!
They said I had an ear for music, which, I love music but couldn't take it in highschool because there was no room in my schedule. Good to hear I still got it in me. I made popcorn for them (burnt the first bag by accident), enjoyed their music, and suddenly I was joining in, full out singing... and was liking it.

It was the first time I had ever sang full out without feeling embarassed or shy, because they didn't care, they were just having fun. To top it all off, we ended up singing Hakuna Matada, then watched The Lion King.

This week will be complete if I get to see Mike, but we'll see.
For now, I must retire to my bed!
Though I wish I got to speak to Mike tonight, it's like a little part of me is missing because I never got to say goodnight, or I love you. I'm setting my alarm for 8 so I can tell him first thing in the morning!

Bye for now,
Laura

... FRACK, the fruit flies follow me! I HAVE NO FOOD, BUG OFF!... no pun intended ; )


Wreckin' Crewwww! I'm True Tiamat





Tuesday, September 2, 2008

First Day

Hello again!

So I got up at 6:15 in the morning. I sat up and started to think 'I wonder if anyone else is up.'
Next thing I know, the girl in the room next to me gets up (heard her alarm), and yoinked the shower.
I shouldn't have waited that extra 5 minutes.
I popped downstairs and attempted to toast an english muffin, but didn't figure it out properly until the girl got out the shower. So long story short, got ready and walked to school, and walked the perimeter of the school until finally found my class.

Well here's the fun part right, I was looking at my Monday classes... but it was Tuesday. So for the first two hours myself, and another girl who made the same mistake, sat in our Monday Art Fundamentals.

We finally figured it out, went to our other class in the last hour, felt like idiots, (or at least I did), and turns out we didn't miss much. Then after classes we walked around together, didn't exchange many words but it wasn't awkward.
I guess we were both just too focused on looking around the school, taking in the surroundings.
We had to pick up art 'kits' for fundies, and kits sounds simple, small cute thing right?

Wrong.

A large cardboard thing that holds paper, and about a 50 pound black bag. That bag is over half my weight, and I will never forget the pain and frustration it took to get that damned thing home. Either shoulder is rubbed raw, even my bra straps hurt to touch the skin.

When I got home an hour after leaving the school (normally 20 minute walk), I threw the stuff down in my room, typed to Mike, vented my frustrations with shaky hands, then went for a two hour nap. I got up and walked over to the mall and picked up a few things. I was in Shoppers and the most random thing came to my attention.

There in front of me "19" Flat Screen, Clearance."
Regularily around $250, was on sale for $199.99. I needed a tv and this was perfect. I was a bit iffy because it's not a well known brand (LLOYD'S) but like I said; I needed a tv. I tried Halo today and I didn't do so bad. I think I made a good choice.
Besides, anything else I could find on the internet for that price was 13", or 15". While I would probably be getting better quality with those tv's, this is for college so I can play xbox, watch movies, or tv, I don't need anything spiffy.

So here I am, just relaxing. My class doesn't start until 3 tomorrow, i'll head in for 2 so I can explore a bit more and find where I can get my Student Card made.
While I have your attention, check out my room!







Monday, September 1, 2008

A New Style

Hi all,
my name is Laura, and i'm a first year college student.

I'm renting out a place, which has its levels of ups and downs. I had got a bunch of IKEA furniture, and my most loved boyfriend Mike, helped me build it. It was great to build frustrating furniture together for 6 hours, without actually getting frustrated with each other.
And to reward ourselves after such a long day of going up and down stairs, building furniture, and attempting to stay outta each others way in a hot, cramped space; went to The Keg.
It was good and I would totally go there again... though a bit too expensive for the average student, so perhaps leave that restaurant for special occasions.

Onward!
Next day mom and I went around, got stuff and I unpacked stuff, and did more stuff.
Really, there isn't much to it when it comes to picking up cleaning products, and groceries.
I was tired and stressed the whole day, which I felt bad. I snapped a few times, but really tried hard to be calm.
It just wasn't a very calming, last day to spend with mom.
I should have been more patient.

When she got in the car, after our good byes, I watched mom drive away into the night.
I stood there in the dark of the street just watching her.
It was eerie.

The last time I was left like that for good was when I was in grade 3, mom was picking my sister and I up from school and thought when Lindsay shut her door, she heard my door shut.
I was only reaching for the door handle when she suddenly drove away.
I cried for being abandoned, but that was by accident.

This time, it was much different. An almost empty feeling.

This is the next step in my life. I learn real responsibilities, make logical decisions between wants and needs. Do I really need this brand? Do I really need this cereal if this one is half off? I was always good about spending, but i'll no doubt become more frugal.
It's also a test for Mike and I's relationship. We just need to make it through school, and I think we can do it.

For now i'm all unpacked, I may rearrange my room a bit more, maybe not. Though for now, i'm heading to bed, I have a 6am wakeup call because I want to be all ready for my first day, give myself extra time to get there and find my classes. Plus i'm starting to get hungry so i'll go to bed before I get starving! ... no i'm not starving myself. I like food!

Until my next update; later!

- Laura