New York (finally)!!

Well, my post about my trip to New York is long over due. I've been home nearly a month now and things have been a little chaotic. I had a class that kept me insanely busy for two weeks, then I needed to write my blog posts for the New York class which are boring, academic, and not at all interesting so I'm not going to link you to that blog. Then I tried to cut my finger off, which made typing a might difficult (it still kind of aches and looks disgusting, but I'm dealing).

So here it is! The post you've been waiting for (I'm so sure *sarcasm*): my trip to New York!

Sunday

I got in Saturday evening and spent it sleeping mostly. Sunday I slept in and took my time getting ready so I could take the subway to Times Square to see my first show: "Pippin."

We stayed at the Leo House in Chelsea so it was a really short ride on the subway to Times Square. "Pippin" was the one show I paid full price tickets for in advance. I love (LOVE) musicals, and one of my favorite Broadway singers is Terrence Mann and I had looked up to see if he was in any shows while I was in New York. I saw he was in "Pippin" so I bought tickets. I didn't really know anything about the show before I went and saw it. And it was definitely the best show I saw that week.

I sat down and pretty soon the guy next to me started talking to me and I found out that he and his whole family had come special to see their son who was one of the lead dancers who also understudied for Terrence Mann. I was fan-girling so hard and trying not to show it. He kept leaning over to me during the show and pointing out cool things about the acrobats, the lead player, and some of the choreography (FOSSE!!), which was awesome. I love that kind of stuff.

Monday

Monday was the first day of the class itself. There were groups of school counselors (students and licensed) from schools from Oregon, Florida, Missouri, New York, and even a few students from Turkey. We started the day with just the students from PSU. We were originally going to go to Ellis Island but, alas, it was still closed from damages from Sandy. So, instead, we went to the Native American History Museum which is right next to Battery Park.

After walking around the museum a while, a few of us decided to run to the ferry dock to see if we could catch sight of the Statue of Liberty.

We then hiked up to Wall Street for a quick bite to eat before meeting up with the rest of the groups for orientation, which was a bit of a bust. Our "icebreaker" ended up being a lecture about Dominican faceless dolls which, while interesting, might have been more appropriate with the panel at El Museo de Barrio on Friday.

After the "icebreaker," we had a panel of students from the International High School of Brooklyn come and talk with us. They had some pretty amazing stories and it was neat hearing their perspective as well as hearing about the school itself, which is a pretty unique school.

The classes broke up for a few hours for a dinner break, but a few of us decided to hike out to Ground Zero to see the 9/11 Memorial. It was ridiculously hot. The ground was literally radiating heat we could feel through our shoes.

It was a little bit cooler by the Infinity Pool, but not much. I think the experience might have been a bit more emotionally stimulating if it hadn't been so ridiculously hot. Ugh!

After the memorial, and a quick detour to the waterfront after heading the wrong direction looking for the subway, we made a quick stop to change our sweaty clothes and shower super quick before heading out to see "Crossing the Boulevard," a multimedia presentation of stories of immigrants living in Queens. It was really fun and her book by the same name is full of fascinating stories. This video is about 10 minutes long, but it gives a really good feel of what the show is like.

I took a second shower, and headed to bed.

Tuesday

We spent Tuesday in Harlem. First we spoke to a panel of people who talked about working with African American students in schools. It was interesting, but had a particularly New York point of view.

We had soul food at Sylvias for lunch. It was SOOOO GOOD. I had fried chicken, candied yams, and collard greens. So very good.

After lunch, some of us hiked over to the Apollo Theater, which turned out to be closed. Sad! But, still, we saw it. On our way back, we saw a beautiful mural.

We got a little lost trying to find the Abyssinian Baptist Church, so we got there a little late, but it was very interesting hearing the history and seeing how involved that church is in the community, but we weren't allowed to take pictures. Sad day.

When we were done at the church, some of us headed over to the African Market which was a small market with handmade craft things. I didn't buy anything, but I was sorely tempted a few times.

Wednesday

This was probably the best and most exhausting day of the entire week. I loved (almost) every minute of it.

First thing, we took the subway all the way up to Riverdale then hiked (literally; all up hill with a set of steps that was, like, twice the length of the stairs of death up from the RB at BYU) up to a orthodox synagogue where we heard from Rabbi Steve who was absolutely amazing. He was very open to our questions and made it clear that no question was too odd and was very good at explaining things. He even took out the Torah and read for us the section where Moses comes down off the mountain and finds his people worshiping a golden calf. It was a very unique experience.

We were running a little late because we had so many questions for the rabbi, so we had to book it to the subway so we could get down to the Islam Cultural Center to hear from the imam there. We were able to inhale a piece of pizza before heading into the mosque.

 All the women were asked to cover their heads while inside the mosque out of respect, and everyone was really good about not complaining about it, even though it was really hot. Some of us wore them more gracefully than others. I am obviously new to this.

We then heard from the imam, the religious leader, who was very interesting, if a little bit controversial. Some of the Muslims in our group later explained that he was very, very conservative and that many, if not most, Muslims don't think like him. It was an interesting experience, but sitting on the floor for an hour and a half was a bit uncomfortable.

After grabbing something to eat and a quick shower back at the hotel, I went with the rest of the group to go see "Kinky Boots," show number two of the week. It was really, really great.

 And, even BETTER, we got to have a talk back after the show! It was awesome.

 My boss, Dina, has a friend in the show. If you happen to watch some of the online videos, he's the guy who does a back flip while wearing six inch heels. And he went to BYU! How cool is that? He's the guy in the red shirt, fourth from the left.

I had meant to get him to sign a program for Dina (and, hey, me too), but I totally clammed up. Totally regretting that. But I did get a photo in front of the theater. :)

Thursday

Thursday was another hot, hot day. We started out at the Museum of the Chinese in America. We had a panel, and then we walked around the museum a bit before going on a shortened version of the neighborhood walk.

 Our group broke off and ate lunch from Tasty Dumpling in the park.

 Then we headed into Little Italy for some shopping and gelato. It was so hot that we had to eat our gelato super fast while it melted, making us all feel a little ill.

 After a quick shower at the hotel, I headed out alone to try the lottery for tickets to Book of Mormon: the Musical. I tried twice and didn't get in either time. Nuts.

 However, I did get tickets to "Peter and the Star Catcher" which was a really cute play. Very funny.

Friday

By Friday, all of us were a little wiped. It was super hot and super humid all week and we were all a little the worse for wear.

We started off at El Museo de Barrio in Spanish Harlem, which was totally up my ally. After a panel, we walked around the museum which had some really fun pieces.

 We then took a short neighborhood walk of Spanish Harlem. We stopped at this beautiful mural which, coincidentally, was right next to lunch.

Myself and another girl tried for the Book of Mormon lottery again but didn't make it so, instead, we went back to Chelsea for a dinner of Tapas.

Saturday

I had all day Saturday to myself. I went out early and tried to get rush tickets to Matilda, but they sold out. So, instead, I got in line at TKTS and eventually the lady in front of me convinced me to see "Spiderman: Turn off the Dark." It was pretty ridiculous. The music was loud and fun (BONO!!) but the songs were cheesy even by my standards. But the acrobatics were really cool and having them fly out over the audience was really cool.

I was going to call it a day, but then I called Jesi so she could convince me to go see another show. I caught show number five of the week, "Once." It was pretty, but I hated the ending. Arthur Darvill from Doctor Who played the lead and he was awesome. Everyone played their own instruments on stage, accompanying themselves and sometimes dancing, playing, and singing at the same time! That was cool. Also cool, the set was a pub, and before the show and during intermission, people could go onstage to buy a drink. And then some of the actors came out and played like it was a real pub! How cool is that?

And then it was over. What a week! I obviously had a great (if sweaty) time. Did some great things, saw some fabulous shows, and all in great company. After my week there, I again reaffirmed my belief that I would never want to live in New York City, but being close wouldn't be too bad. If only for Broadway. ;)

Back from Hawaii and off to New York!

It's been a while, eh? Parents had a great time on their cruise and spending time in Barcelona. They were home for a few days before heading out again, this time for Hawaii. I spent the next few weeks after that finishing up school and work, work, working. I finished painting my room (yay!) so it is now a lovely shade of light grey! I'm excited to get started moving all my stuff in and actually making it my room. However, that will have to wait until I get back from New York which I leave for tomorrow! SO EXCITED!!!

I met the family in Kona on Jesi's birthday (happy birthday, Chicky!!) and we spent almost two weeks doing, like, NOTHING. It was fabulous. We spent most of our time laying around the condo, sometimes going out to sit by the pool. We watched two seasons of Downton Abby and some pretty awesomely ridiculous action movies. Every few days, we'd venture out into town to go to Walmart or check out some local shops. Mostly we just relaxed, though. Which is just the way we like it!

We did one snorkel trip which was awesome. We didn't see very many colorful fish, but we swam with wild spinner dolphins!

It was really cool.

We also saw a tiger shark (from the boat, of course)! Dad took a video of it swimming around and it's posted on his Facebook.

Now, I'm just finishing getting ready for my trip to New York. I am all packed, I just need to make my lunch for the plane and set up my music on my iPod, maybe get another book for my kindle, then I'm all set! I am so ridiculously excited for this trip! We are going to go so many cool places, and I am already set to see two fabulous Broadway shows (my favorite part!). You can bet that there will be lots to talk about when I get back. Hopefully I'll remember to take lots of pictures for your viewing pleasure.

Well, I'm off! I have to leave for the airport at 3:30am tomorrow (Thank you, Sister Fisher, for the ride!).

Loves and hugs!!

Sabbatical Begins!!

Today has been a fabulous day. Well, it started off a little rocky, but that's only because I stayed up helping the rest of the family pack and move things from the old craft room and into the new craft house (which is "done" by the way!!). Then I had to get up early to take the fam to the max station so they could go to the airport.

Let's ignore the fact that they left me to go on a two week Disney cruise through the Bahamas and then across the Atlantic. Let's IGNORE the fact that they will then land in Barcelona and spend almost a week touring the beautiful buildings by Gaudi, eating tasty paella, and shopping for cute stuff. Without me.

Ignore all that.

Let's focus on the fact that I got to do WHATEVER I WANTED TODAY!! I had a little bit of homework to do and at some point before work tomorrow I need to mend the pocket on my work apron. But that's all I HAD to do.

Dishwasher needs to be unloaded? Meh. I can pull dishes out as I need them.

Laundry to put away? Whatevs. Jesi isn't here to get her clothes mixed up with mine.

Granted, I put these things off all the time. There's just no guilt right now thinking about what Mom would say if she noticed such things haven't been done.

What DID I do? I finally got a chance to watch some more of Rooftop Prince (the Korean drama I am currently working on). I also played with some makeup trying to do something that might work with an Ursula costume. No, I'm not posting pictures of my drag queen makeup. It still needs some refining. Namely the eyebrows. How do you cover up the real eyebrows so you can draw on the really high black ones? I don't know.

Now I'm thinking I might go see a movie (Ursula makeup has been removed and replaced with my more normal routine). I'm torn between Oblivion and Star Trek. I really want to see both of them... but I don't know which one to see tonight! Probably Oblivion and then see Star Trek next week. We'll see.

So, while the family is gone, I plan on doing some fun things. Like... um... reading up on the prevalence and treatment of borderline personality disorder? No, that's homework. Writing a report about examining the results of a NEO PI-R and STRONG assessment? Nope, also homework. Work, work, work... Well, at some point I should have some time for fun!

Dad was able to move some of the big things out of Mom's old craft room and make it possible for me to paint in there!! Did I mention that I get her old craft room for my new room? Yay! I'm so excited!! I'll be moving out the smaller things while they are gone and painting around the large furniture that's left in there (Dad was able to get it all into the middle of the room for me). I might even start moving some of my own stuff into the shelves. I'm REALLY excited about my new room. It's going to be super cute. ^_^

All in all, life is good. I got promoted to assistant store manager and we got some new people at work so things, as usual, are pretty busy over at Dream Dinners. I'm doing great in all my classes, though they definitely keep me hopping. A few weeks ago I was inducted into Chi Sigma Iota (the counseling honors society), which is also pretty cool. I got a pin with Greek letters on it and everything.

And that's about it. Not much else going on around here. But, really? Isn't that kind of enough? <3

38 days til Hawaii!
56 days til New York!!

2 terms down!!

What a great end to my second term of grad school! I have been feeling really great, academically speaking, this week.

We had our final in Assessment and Counseling, which I spent much of the weekend studying for. That went fairly well. There were a handful of questions that were much more specific than I had anticipated. But, considering I got a 95% on the midterm, I think I will at least get a B in the class.

After the final in Assessment, we were able to pick up the graded paper for our Practicum section of the class (in short, Assessment in Counseling is broken up into two classes. We only meet for the single class period each week, but the paper gets its own class and grade.) I was a little worried about it. I had looked at several people's papers and mine was very different and I felt like I was either going to totally BOMB the paper, or get an okay grade. So, when I opened the paper to look at my grade I was a little in shock. After I saw that I got 100 points, I had to double check what points it was out of (100, in case you wondered), and then double check that I had picked up the right paper! 100%! I was so happy!!

Then on Thursday, I had my group project presentation. We presented a module for counseling LGBT students based on an Adlerian model. It was a fun project and we were the last group to go so I feel like we might have had an unfair advantage since we got to learn from all the other groups first. Still, I enjoyed it. Since it was the last day of class, we decided to bring the class cupcakes, as well. The professor gave us our feedback during the break and pretty much told us we were all amazing. Midway through her notes there was a comment that said, "You are all 1st years?! Wow! :)" (There are people in the class who are in their second year of the program.)

And then some of us went out to Rogue Hall for some drinks (it apparently has great beer with cool names like dead man's ale and stuff... I had diet coke).

There was a theme in all of the comments and compliments I got this week on my work. Lots of people complimented me on how well organized and laid out everything is. I get the same compliments when I do a talk in church. No joke... people seriously come up and tell me that my talk was well organized. An interesting thing to consider as I continue in my grad program.

All of this self-esteem building was well needed. Last week I decided to google search school counselor job postings just to see and what I saw was scary. I was reading them and thinking, "Dear, God. Can I actually DO THIS?! I'm going to get a job and just seriously screw my kids up WORSE!" It wasn't good. And I'm sure this will happen again. Everyone has doubts. But now I have some pretty concrete stuff I can look back on and say, "Hey! I CAN do a good job on some pretty hard stuff. Go me!" Hopefully that will come in handy as I struggle through the next term.

In other news: I'm officially going to Hawaii!!! Yay!! Only 94 days until two weeks in Hawaii! And then it's only a few days after I get home from there that I head on to my next adventure in New York!! Only 112 days until that!!

So many things to look forward to. I'm very excited. ^^

The Max

I was once the smelly person on the max.

I was on the train to school after finishing at work, and I kept smelling something sour. My immediate though was, "Ugh, who's the wine-o?" I looked around, trying to figure out who smelled like cheap wine. I forgot about the smell until I got off to switch lines when I smelled it again. I looked around, trying to pinpoint the source of the smell. It was only once I smelled it again on the second train that I realized it was me, that I smelled like the white cooking wine from work.

I was the smelly person on the max. The rest of the day I kept getting wind of the smell of cooking wine, inwardly wincing and hoping that other people didn't notice, though, really, I don't know how they couldn't.

This story brings me to the point of today's post: my love-hate relationship with the max. For the most part, I love being able to take the max to school. I don't like driving (especially freeways at night) and parking at school costs about the same as taking the max anyways. It's also nice to have the 40 odd minutes on the train to do a quick review of my text book (not as often as you'd think) or to sit and just listen to my ipod and relax (most often). I was once even given a free ticket by a lady who had purchased her ticket before finding out that her friend was able to come and pick her up. How nice!

However, there are some things about the max that really make me wish driving was my most favorite thing in the world and I drove to and from school every day.

And because I love lists so very much, here is a list of things that I dislike about riding the max:

1) Odorous Individuals
Yes, I was once the smelly person on the max. And I understand that sometimes you just smell and then you ride the max. I feel no ill will towards the smelly. but I still do not take pleasure in their smell.

2) Garbage
People are gross. They leave coffee cups, bags of lunch garbage, cigarette butts, all sorts of trash all over the place. It's not the norm, but you would think with garbage cans at each and every freaking stop, people wouldn't feel so hard pressed to throw their garbage away in an actual bin rather than setting it on a seat on the max.

3) Space Hogs
Also known as inconsiderate jerk faces. When the max is busy, these people will sit on the outside seat and put their bag on the seat next to the window so unless you expressly ask them to move their crap, you are left without a seat.
Jerks.

4) MUSIC
For me, this is THE most annoying thing about riding the max. Talking on your phone? Annoying, but whatever. Listening to music with headphones but I can still hear it? Frustrating, but I don't dislike you or even think you inconsiderate. But play your music on your phone speakers so you don't have to wear headphones because, I don't know, you just couldn't bother? There are no words to describe your rudeness. What are you even thinking as you do this? That you want to help entertain us by playing your annoying music? That you might get paid somehow for helping advertise the artist's music? Because pretty much all you are doing is annoying the hell out of me and most of the other passengers around you.

And then coming up afterwards and telling me to cheer up and "give you a smile" because you thought I look sad (true story)? Nope. Just, no.

Now that I have that off my chest, I'm off to take the max to class. It will probably pass uneventfully and I will most likely have a nice trip. But you never know. ;)

Happy Singles Awareness Day!!

Happy Singles Awareness Day!

Or, as some people like to call it, Valentine's Day.

Valentine's Day has never really been a big holiday for me (and not just because I'm single forever... shut up), but I usually make some kind of Valentine for my parents and sister. And for my class when I was little and they did Valentine's Day exchanges at school. The main thing I like about Valentine's Day is the colors. Pink, of course, is my favorite color (though I fought to deny that fact for a long time), and being able to clashingly pair it with all shades of red is really fun.

For this Valentine's Day, I made three Valentine's. One got sent off to my sister earlier this week and featured a cute little robot. I couldn't for the life of me think of what to do for my parents for the longest time. Cards, of course, but I needed a gift of some kind for them, as well. I wanted to make something, but I didn't know WHAT.

After thinking about it FOREVER, I finally decided to make them healthy little snack boxes!!

It was a lot of fun to make. I got these cute little strawberry shaped lunch boxes when I was in Korea, each with two levels. I filled one level with veggies one with fruits!

On the bottom level, I put yellow peppers, celery, and radishes cut out like little hearts. I also made a ranch veggie dip out of low fat Greek yogurt. It's really yummy and has fewer calories than sour cream.

On top, I put sliced strawberries, kiwis, and blueberries. And a little animal shaped pick to eat with.

 

Of course, no Valentine would be complete without the card. So, I drew them little cards to match the animal sticks in their little snack boxes. Dad got a cute little panda.

 Mom got an adorable bunny.

Each got a little not so healthy treat as well with their gifts. Dad got red vines (it's traditional) and I found this cute little ice cream thing for Mom when I was at Uwajimaya the other day. You mix up some frosting and decorate mini ice cream cones. Well, I think it's frosting. It might not be edible... but it was sitting up front by the candies... so I assume it's food. If it was in Korean I could at least read it and look things up. I know nothing about Japanese so I don't even know where to start.
 

Oh well. I got one for myself to play with as well, so we'll see how it goes. Maybe I'll take pictures and tell you. Maybe I won't. Depends on how much time I want to spend avoiding this evil paper of death for my assessment class.

Ease on down the road...

Can I say how much I love that it's Michael Jackson and Diana Ross in this? I used to love "The Wiz." What can I say? My taste has always gone for the cheesy.

Anyways... the whole point of that title choice is just that life keeps on going and going and going and doesn't slow down after landmarks.

Like midterms of DOOM.

I had a midterm yesterday for my Assessment in Counseling class and I was SUPER stressed about it this week. I spent most of my free time this last week at my computer going through my notes and getting them all condensed and studied. Woof! I got super tired of trying to remember the difference between the different types of reliability. I'm glad I studied so much, though, because the test got into some REAL specific details, some of which I'm not sure if I remembered or not (such as the difference between standard error of difference and standard error of estimate). We'll find out next week how I did. Crossing fingers!

Then, right after we finished the exam, we talked about the specifics of our assessment research paper. We have to examine three different test manuals and decide if they would work for our demographic (I'm not sure how specific we are supposed to get for our demographic... he just has us listed out by track: rehabilitation, marriage and family, etc. I'm on the school counseling track.). We have to keep the manuals in the library so I'll have to write a great deal of my paper on campus. Joy. We'll see what days work best for getting into the library for me.

Other than school, not much else is going on as far as immediate activities. I HAVE been busy making plans for my New York trip this summer. Woo hoo!! I am ridiculously excited about the trip. My friend Maggie and I will be going a few days early and staying a few days after the class itself to do some extra things while we are there. The class is on Multicultural Counseling. We'll be going to the different burrows and talking with leaders of different cultural communities, going through museums, eating tasty foods, seeing some presentations and a Broadway show. I'm really looking forward to the experience. I think I will get a lot more out of this experience than just taking the regular classroom option.

Also, my boss has a friend in the show that the group plans on seeing together: Cindy Lauper's "Kinky Boots." It looks really fun and I'm super excited to look for her friend on the stage. I plan on going to see a few shows by myself as well, buying last minute student tickets.

I'm freaking out excited, people.

And that's the update on Jen. There will probably be more exciting pictures and stuff once I start helping Mom move into the craft room, getting my new room all set up, and then Hawaii and New York this Summer. Yes!!

Loves and hugs, peoples!! ^^