![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Jan. 5th, 2012 03:13 amAfter biking to my class in the frigid record breaking cold snap (it was like Xzibit had heard I liked to get dressed, so he put pants under my pants and shirts under my shirts, so I could wear clothes while I wore clothes) for my spanish class (because I am gonna be fluent, damnitt), which was awesomely diverse (thugged out thugs of many colors, flamboyantly made up gay dude with lots of flower tattoos - I was sitting between a blond redneck and a Phillipino, wut?)...alright this sentence is too long. Anyway I biked over to the health food store and got more priobiotics. I logged into my virtual classes and viewed their syllabi (<-- pfft) and did my dumb intros on the messageboards as required*.
I found out Elise's preschool teacher, Denise, who I ADORE and who is Aaron's friend's mom and our neighbor, has been out because she was hospitalized for e. coli and had to get a blood transfusion :/ She just got home Sunday. We're making her cards and baking her something. I feel so awful for her, and her family.
*Hi, everybody! I'm Cuban, from Key West, and live in Homestead. I'm a writer and a psych major. My husband is in I.T. and we have five closely spaced kids, aged 4-11. I've stayed home with them full time for the last decade - basically since high school graduation - but now that my youngest is in preschool it feels good to think about my own future again. I blog, have a childrens book that's being illustrated, and some short stories I'm self publishing for e-readers. This is my 3rd full time semester at Miami Dade College and I'm still trying to decide exactly what direction I'm going in with psychology. There are a lot of really great options to choose from and I still have a little while to decide.
I like cooking, mermaids, rum, thunderstorms, staying up too late, going to the beach at night, antique jewelry, roadtrips, bubble baths and Starbucks. I'm drawn towards the gothic and sensual, as a general rule. I dislike trips to the grocery store, my husband's very long commute, the sun shining directly on my face, and when people act as though curse words are really terrible. I'm very patient and my children make me happy, but I hate hearing nagging coming out of my mouth. We have afternoon tea outside most days, and I read to them before bed most nights. I love music and am a big fan of Florence and the Machine, Mumford and Sons, Queen, Vivaldi, and Bach. I'm extremely disgusted by wet paper, cigarettes, and ranch dressing.
I find it convenient that this course will force me to attend places and events I want to anyway but might have a hard time justifying otherwise.
1. This house is WAY too quiet, too simple, too empty, without Aaron. He's been at Cybele's house since Sunday and I really, really miss him. He's having the time of his life. And apparently EFFORTLESSLY doing all his multiplication and creative writing every day, while Adrian does his schoolwork O_O The two of them are kayaking around in the canal full of manatees behind their house every day - since it's so cold, the manatees have had to swim inland and so they're actually kind of dense. They can feed them vegetables and pet them when they come up to breathe. Kayak battles in the swimming pool are also much more high stakes with the water so cold.
2. I spent quite awhile going over my degree audit, MDC's course sheets, FIU's psych dept transfer requirements, and ways to improve my GPA. My semester GPAs have been great but dropping out midway through classes years ago and getting a couple of Fs has made my cumulative abysmal :/ I just have to retake those two classes to replace the grades; both of them are courses I think I could ace fairly easily. THE POINT IS that after quite a lot of research, thought, conversation with Ananda since we were sitting at the dining table working on our separate things alone in the room, and so on...I am seriously considering going for my bachelor's in neuroscience at UM. Their neuroscience program is rigorous and I'd have to have a 3.8 to transfer in (which is possible if I do really really well for the second half of this AA, and replace those grades I mentioned, according to my calculations). You can choose a psychobiology or a neurobiology track for your bachelors, and your coursework is partially in their medical school, which is attached to teaching hospitals. It sounds so engaging, fascinating and challenging and just, wow. I've been seeking out neurology articles and books for 15 years, but really thinking about neuroplasticity specifically almost daily since Elise was born. You can go on from a bachelors in neuroscience to get a masters in psych, which has been my plan all along. It's just a masters in psych that allows you to be a lot more well versed in what is going on, on a physiological level, than a normal psych masters might - and to have more clout should you choose to research or write about your work in the field. It is not a math-centric curriculum at all, or I wouldn't even really consider it. Electrifying considerations!
Last night I experienced one of the greatest moments of my life. I realize that is going to sound extremely melodramatic as you continue reading, but I am dead serious. I was feeling VERY overwhelmed about everything I'm working on right now. Good and capable, but also like it can be heavy and I might need to cry myself to sleep before getting up to start again. It was also colder than it's been in at least a year - "record breaking cold snap" is what everyone is saying, freeze warning, etc. I was very low on sleep, staring at my bed, shivering, thinking how early I was going to have to wake up and how difficult some of the things I'm committing myself to are going to be (non-educational things I haven't written about yet). I'm triggered by the cold. I can never sleep lately, either. And then Grant came in with a giant comforter hot out of the dryer and wrapped me in it from behind before I knew what was happening. I went into an uncontrollable giggling fit. Being surrounded in soft heat was like sudden euphoria. He also changed our sheets to fleece ones we had from a winter camping trip and had an electric blanket going on top of them; I stripped off all my clothes and lay down on all that, under this hot blanket, and seriously just laughed and rolled around in complete bliss for about 10 minutes.
I felt a lot better, and slept well, after that. The man is amazing. I was smiling about it on my way to class, this morning.
2 am all to myself.
The view as I make dinner.
Twilight.
This kid's fashion sense always involves being in some kind of full-on get-up. He has a yellow and a purple bandanna that get used sometimes, several jackets that he creatively buttons (WHY WHY WHY), various gloves (some manufactured fingerless, others altered to be that way), and spends a crazy, obsessive amount of time on his hair every day. What you can't see in this pick is that he has on a sparkly purple and black striped nylon shirt from a previous dance performance. Grant keeps finding his mousse bottle empty.
Sisters listening to Charlotte's Web.
Starbucks bathroom and the outfit I'm living in.
A rare picture of my face that I don't think is horrible. I like my face in mirrors just fine, don't even bother with makeup - but I am NOT photogenic. Maybe I can print and cut this out tiny and paste it over my drivers' license shot...
Grant and I went and saw Sherlock Holmes the other night (which I recommend) and when we got back, Ananda was showing Elise songs and dresses and things.
We took the children to the zoo for the first time in almost a year (minus Aaron, since he's been gone). The first thing I thought when I saw them playing was how shockingly THIN they are. All my previous pictures of them playing in water feature poochy toddler/preschooler bellies!
Oh, Isaac. This is because he got "sprayed in the head" (and Grant was tending him, I was only slyly taking a picture not being neglectful).
And this is what Annie does while they play in the water.
What in the name of all that is holy is going on in this picture?! My 11 year old daughter is a woman.
A woman who still wears her Girl Scout shirt and likes milk and cookies.
They're getting ready to start selling cookies.
I found out Elise's preschool teacher, Denise, who I ADORE and who is Aaron's friend's mom and our neighbor, has been out because she was hospitalized for e. coli and had to get a blood transfusion :/ She just got home Sunday. We're making her cards and baking her something. I feel so awful for her, and her family.
*Hi, everybody! I'm Cuban, from Key West, and live in Homestead. I'm a writer and a psych major. My husband is in I.T. and we have five closely spaced kids, aged 4-11. I've stayed home with them full time for the last decade - basically since high school graduation - but now that my youngest is in preschool it feels good to think about my own future again. I blog, have a childrens book that's being illustrated, and some short stories I'm self publishing for e-readers. This is my 3rd full time semester at Miami Dade College and I'm still trying to decide exactly what direction I'm going in with psychology. There are a lot of really great options to choose from and I still have a little while to decide.
I like cooking, mermaids, rum, thunderstorms, staying up too late, going to the beach at night, antique jewelry, roadtrips, bubble baths and Starbucks. I'm drawn towards the gothic and sensual, as a general rule. I dislike trips to the grocery store, my husband's very long commute, the sun shining directly on my face, and when people act as though curse words are really terrible. I'm very patient and my children make me happy, but I hate hearing nagging coming out of my mouth. We have afternoon tea outside most days, and I read to them before bed most nights. I love music and am a big fan of Florence and the Machine, Mumford and Sons, Queen, Vivaldi, and Bach. I'm extremely disgusted by wet paper, cigarettes, and ranch dressing.
I find it convenient that this course will force me to attend places and events I want to anyway but might have a hard time justifying otherwise.
1. This house is WAY too quiet, too simple, too empty, without Aaron. He's been at Cybele's house since Sunday and I really, really miss him. He's having the time of his life. And apparently EFFORTLESSLY doing all his multiplication and creative writing every day, while Adrian does his schoolwork O_O The two of them are kayaking around in the canal full of manatees behind their house every day - since it's so cold, the manatees have had to swim inland and so they're actually kind of dense. They can feed them vegetables and pet them when they come up to breathe. Kayak battles in the swimming pool are also much more high stakes with the water so cold.
2. I spent quite awhile going over my degree audit, MDC's course sheets, FIU's psych dept transfer requirements, and ways to improve my GPA. My semester GPAs have been great but dropping out midway through classes years ago and getting a couple of Fs has made my cumulative abysmal :/ I just have to retake those two classes to replace the grades; both of them are courses I think I could ace fairly easily. THE POINT IS that after quite a lot of research, thought, conversation with Ananda since we were sitting at the dining table working on our separate things alone in the room, and so on...I am seriously considering going for my bachelor's in neuroscience at UM. Their neuroscience program is rigorous and I'd have to have a 3.8 to transfer in (which is possible if I do really really well for the second half of this AA, and replace those grades I mentioned, according to my calculations). You can choose a psychobiology or a neurobiology track for your bachelors, and your coursework is partially in their medical school, which is attached to teaching hospitals. It sounds so engaging, fascinating and challenging and just, wow. I've been seeking out neurology articles and books for 15 years, but really thinking about neuroplasticity specifically almost daily since Elise was born. You can go on from a bachelors in neuroscience to get a masters in psych, which has been my plan all along. It's just a masters in psych that allows you to be a lot more well versed in what is going on, on a physiological level, than a normal psych masters might - and to have more clout should you choose to research or write about your work in the field. It is not a math-centric curriculum at all, or I wouldn't even really consider it. Electrifying considerations!
Last night I experienced one of the greatest moments of my life. I realize that is going to sound extremely melodramatic as you continue reading, but I am dead serious. I was feeling VERY overwhelmed about everything I'm working on right now. Good and capable, but also like it can be heavy and I might need to cry myself to sleep before getting up to start again. It was also colder than it's been in at least a year - "record breaking cold snap" is what everyone is saying, freeze warning, etc. I was very low on sleep, staring at my bed, shivering, thinking how early I was going to have to wake up and how difficult some of the things I'm committing myself to are going to be (non-educational things I haven't written about yet). I'm triggered by the cold. I can never sleep lately, either. And then Grant came in with a giant comforter hot out of the dryer and wrapped me in it from behind before I knew what was happening. I went into an uncontrollable giggling fit. Being surrounded in soft heat was like sudden euphoria. He also changed our sheets to fleece ones we had from a winter camping trip and had an electric blanket going on top of them; I stripped off all my clothes and lay down on all that, under this hot blanket, and seriously just laughed and rolled around in complete bliss for about 10 minutes.
I felt a lot better, and slept well, after that. The man is amazing. I was smiling about it on my way to class, this morning.
2 am all to myself.
The view as I make dinner.
Twilight.
This kid's fashion sense always involves being in some kind of full-on get-up. He has a yellow and a purple bandanna that get used sometimes, several jackets that he creatively buttons (WHY WHY WHY), various gloves (some manufactured fingerless, others altered to be that way), and spends a crazy, obsessive amount of time on his hair every day. What you can't see in this pick is that he has on a sparkly purple and black striped nylon shirt from a previous dance performance. Grant keeps finding his mousse bottle empty.
Sisters listening to Charlotte's Web.
Starbucks bathroom and the outfit I'm living in.
A rare picture of my face that I don't think is horrible. I like my face in mirrors just fine, don't even bother with makeup - but I am NOT photogenic. Maybe I can print and cut this out tiny and paste it over my drivers' license shot...
Grant and I went and saw Sherlock Holmes the other night (which I recommend) and when we got back, Ananda was showing Elise songs and dresses and things.
We took the children to the zoo for the first time in almost a year (minus Aaron, since he's been gone). The first thing I thought when I saw them playing was how shockingly THIN they are. All my previous pictures of them playing in water feature poochy toddler/preschooler bellies!
Oh, Isaac. This is because he got "sprayed in the head" (and Grant was tending him, I was only slyly taking a picture not being neglectful).
And this is what Annie does while they play in the water.
What in the name of all that is holy is going on in this picture?! My 11 year old daughter is a woman.
A woman who still wears her Girl Scout shirt and likes milk and cookies.
They're getting ready to start selling cookies.
Tags:
- "cold" weather,
- aaron,
- ananda,
- college,
- elise,
- girl scouts,
- grant,
- isaac,
- jake,
- neuroscience,
- pictures,
- zoo
