Don't be so uptight.

Sometimes I just need to hear it said.

I think that things are rather lovely. Music's lovely. Cooking's lovely. Being active and eating healthy are lovely (but apple pie should be lovely as well). And people are lovely.

I've been devising money making strategies today. On my list of things to investigate are plasma donation and psychology experiments. Zac suggested Covance, as well. Maybe I'll see if there are any studies happening during my spring break in March. Also on my mind has been possible places to wait tables this summer-- ideally, it'd be a place that's pretty busy, with a nice atmosphere, and lacking a multitude of annoying patronage. Waitressing would leave allow me to check off one more thing from my mental list of things to do before I die. It's kind of an unofficial list of things that I feel like I should get done, that changes from time to time. My bucket list? Not too exciting of a bucket list, but oh well.

I'm back on caffeine. It's amazing. I'm allowed a vice, right? I'll just have to make sure that I occasionally invest in teeth whitening kits to remove the stains from my mouth. If my dentist notices a difference in the health of my teeth, that'd cause me to decrease my intake, I think. Any day in my life that I discover I've got a bun in the oven, I'd pretty much cut it out, too. Fetuses have enough to worry about without being hyped up on too much caffeine.

I dug out Civ 4 a few days ago and played for a couple hours. I might pull it out again tonight for awhile. It was kind of amazing. I'd forgotten how much fun it is to build stuff. Civilizations, in particular.

People are lovely! I want to make sure I visit Beth before too long-- I want to go see Body Worlds at the MPM before it's gone, and I think that'd be a nice time to stop by, if not before then. Dinner parties have also been on my mind lately. Sarah's back in town and while I'm too poor to go out to dinner more than every once in a great while, it'd be nice to hang out. I need to get together with Keli and Daniela before we all graduate as well. A dinner party with them would be quite wonderful.

Amanda provided me with some guidance on beginning to knit (and attends regular knitting parties!), so perhaps when I have a few dollars to spare, I'll go pick up my needles and some wool yarn and begin project one: a scarf. I'm pumped. Projects are fun. After scarves, I want to learn to knit mittens and hats. I think it'd be really awesome to be able to make a bunch and then donate them to kids (or people in general, I guess) who don't have any. I'd keep several on hand in my classroom. Projects for a better world. Bookshelves have been on my mind lately as well. There's not really much donating I could do with those, but it'd be good to have more, I think. I'll have to do some investigating into plans for some that I want to build. I could gather the wood and probably put it together in a day or so at my parents'.

Time goes by so quickly. I start student teaching in a week and graduate in four months. I've been waiting for this for five years and here it is. My goal is to put myself out there, try new things and really get a good feel for what I'll want to do in my own classroom (hopefully, eek!) next fall.