Wow I had a crazy afternoon! I went to Lynn today to make sure that everything is in order so I can start the semester off without a hitch.

First, I went to the Parking Office to get a decal for my car. The person in charge was at lunch.

So I decided to go to SAS to find out why I had a hold on my account that was keeping me from checking in. I almost had a heart attack when the lady I was talking to told me that I still owed a ridiculous amount of money. It turns out that she had forgotten to add my awards to the equation. We got everything worked out and the hold was taken off of my account.

Next, I went to ask the work study dept. how much money I had available for work study so that I could get my hours. They sent me back to SAS because they were missing paperwork. SAS told me the amount and talked to the work study dept., so that was cleared up.

My next trip was to the library to let Vesko know how much I could work. He was at lunch.

So, I walked back across campus to the nurse’s office. I had blisters and needed two band aids. She generously gave me four.

Then I headed to the parking office, and the guy was back from lunch, so I was able to get a red sticker for my car, which means I can park almost anywhere on campus! I walked to my car, and stuck it on my windshield.

Then, I walked to the College of Arts and Sciences in Frieburger. I talked to Sally, the secretary, and she gave me some tape to put over my band aids, which refused to stay on my heels. I needed to talk to Dr. Morgan, my advisor, about adding another class, because I was one short. He had left for the day. Fortunately, Dr. Goldstein was there, and she set me up for my new class. I’m taking Creative Writing Poetry, British Literature I, Abnormal Psychology, Scientific Literacy, and Computer Applications.

I decided to walk back to my car (where I rememembered that I had another pair of shoes!) and drove around to the parking lot behind the library, because I still needed to talk to Vesko about scheduling my hours.  However, he had a different award amount than what SAS had told me.

So I had to walk back over to SAS and find out why the amounts were different (Vesko’s sheet was done by semester instead of year, so it was less).

Then I walked back to the library and decided with Vesko what hours I could work with my schedule. We decided every Monday and Wednesday from 8:30-9:30 and 2-6. That will still give me time to work my other job at Barnes and Noble….

…Which was my next stop. I had to let my supervisor there know my availability so she could start scheduling me as soon as possible.

That ended a very productive day. I went back to my friend’s apartment and just relaxed for the remainder of it. I wanted to go to the Marketing Department and see Ashlea, Jason, and Debbie, 3 of my fellow bloggers, but I thought it should wait for a day when I was not so worn out. I might go over there on Monday to catch up with them.

My best friend Marsha got married August 9th.

I was a bridesmaid! Marsha and Michael (the new husband) let me stay with them while I was there. I arrived in Louisiana earlier than her Maid of Honor, so I helped her get ready for the wedding and set up the church with her parents. The day of the wedding was crazy! Us girls went to get our hair done an hour and a half before we went to the church….that was not long enough. We got to the church late, which meant the men got to the church late because we had to be there first. Somehow, the ring bearer’s suit and the flower girls’ dresses got locked in a room that no one had a key to. Marsha’s dad cut his hand really deeply on the door while he was trying to force it open (he had to get stitches after the wedding). I was in charge of the two year old ring bearer, which means I held his hand down the aisle and had to coax him out of the bride’s spot where he decided it would be best to stand. He also thought it would be fun to step on the bride’s train and run around behind the preacher….. Then, after the wedding, the newly married couple realized they had left their marriage certificate at home. The groomsman had to go and retrieve it so that the wedding pictures could commence. At the reception, some crazy person put me in charge of cutting the groom’s cake….which was chocolate….and covered in chocolate-covered strawberries…..I told everyone that they would be lucky to get any.  And then I destroyed it. 

It is not smart to put me in charge of cutting a cake….it was not pretty when I was finished.  There weren’t many single men and women to catch the garter and bouquet: only four boys and five girls. Marsha threw the bouquet practically straight to my sister. 

 She didn’t want it. Marsha and Michael went to Vicksburg, MS for two days after their wedding and I got to stay at their place alone. I decided that, since I was running low on money, I would clean her house as a wedding gift. So when they went on their two day honeymoon, I cleaned. I cleaned their bathroom, kitchen, dining room, desk, and living room (I didn’t venture into the bedroom). I wasn’t there when they came home, but they said they were afraid they had gone into the wrong apartment. The cleanliness lasted until they opened their wedding gifts, which, along with the boxes and papers and bags, were strewn all over the living room. I didn’t stay with them for much longer after they returned.

I arrived in Boca Raton last night at 6:00 pm. Trying to get here was a disaster! I actually left Louisiana (where I was for my friend’s wedding) on Saturday, August 16th. When I got to about Jackson, Mississippi, my car stopped accelerating. It refused to move into 4th gear, so I was going down the highway at 40mph trying to get to an exit. I started calling everyone in my family and everyone I know in Louisiana, trying to get ideas about what to do. I didn’t know if I should call a tow or have someone pick me up.

Fortunately, my sister knew someone (our friend Phillip) who knew someone who had a trailer. Phillip drove all the way to Jackson, picked up me and my car, and drove me back to Louisiana. I stayed with me for the next week while we tried to figure out what was wrong with my car and how to fix it. It turns out that running over that piece of metal in Virginia had done more damage than I thought. It dented my catilitic converter so badly that it was stopped up, and that was causing my lack of acceleration.

Again, I was fortunate in that Phillip and one of his friends were able to fix my car, and I didn’t have to have it taken to a garage. The same night, I was taking my sister home, and when I tried to turn off my car, it wouldn’t shut off. I pulled the key out of the ignition, and it still wouldn’t go off. I called Phillip, and he unplugged the battery…. The car was still on. He finally had to unplug a cylinder to get it to shut down. We took it to a Chevy dealer soon after for them to fix it. The car would not do it for them. It worked perfectly fine. We were all so frustrated with my car by this time. I decided to wait a few days to see if it would act up again, but it didn’t.

But by the time it was fixed and running smoothly (well, mostly smoothly–a little louder), Hurricane Faye was hovering over South Florida. Everyone thought it was best if I didn’t leave right away.  So I stayed and hung out with people that I’ve known for years, but haven’t seen in a long time (I’ll blog more about them soon).

So, finally, everything was working and Faye had subsided a bit. I decided I would leave again on Tuesday, August 26th. I left at 9 am and I soon as I got down the street, I got a phone call from Phillip. He said to turn around; there was a pipe hanging from the bottom of my car and he saw it as I pulled out of the driveway. So I came back, he took it somewhere and bolted the pipe up and I left around 12:30 with no further interruptions or disasters. I am so relieved that my car didn’t break down again somewhere that no one could help me. Now, I don’t have to worry about anything for a while except going back to work and moving onto campus (yay!) on the 6th.

Hey all! I haven’t blogged in a while and I don’t know when I’ll get a chance to actually be able to. It’s been busy! I’m in Louisiana, where my best friend just got married, and I don’t have the constant access to the internet that I’m used to. As soon as I do again, I will blog all about my adventures down here. You’ll just have to be patient for a little while longer!

I set out on my first road trip alone this morning at 8 am. My best friend is getting married on August 9th, and I’m her bridesmaid, so I set out for Louisiana. My car is packed to the brim with everything I need to go back to Lynn, because I’m going straight to Boca soon after the wedding.

The trip started out great (except for a short 3 times in Jersey, where I got lost). Then, in Pulaski, Virginia, I ran over a huge hunk of metal at 70mph.

Not healthy for my car.

I had no idea what to do. Having never owned a car, I had never been in this situation. My closest family is over 200 miles away (with family in Maryland and Tennessee, I would, naturally, get stuck between the two), and I don’t know who to call or where to go for help. A trucker pulled over ahead of me to help, and a cop showed up behind me, so I wasn’t clueless for long. The cop found out where the metal had come from because the trucker whose truck it had fallen off of pulled over to drag the metal off the road. He was able to get the trucker’s information to give to me to give to my insurance company.  He also called a tow truck for me. I’m going to call them in the morning and find out the damage done to my car. Then, the cop brought me to a hotel. I haven’t been in a police car since I was 8 (I ran away from home), so it was an interesting ride.

Now I’m sitting at a Comfort Inn in the middle of nowhere Virginia with family calling me every few minutes to make sure I’m okay and see if they can do anything to help. I won’t know anything else tomorrow, so wish me luck. I hope my damage is minimal!