The home stretch

Just this week and next week, then finals. Lovely.

I feel so stressed right now. I have to finish my stuff for my Workplace Tech class by the 20th, which is in 10 days. I've barely started it. I did find places to test a BlackBerry and a Tablet PC though so that is good, and that is pretty much all I have left to do for those sections. I started the PDA section but got bored with it and didn't finish, probably cause I was working on my "X.A.N.A. Attack Progression" video, which took practically all day Monday, some of yesterday, and a good part of today to finish, and I wanted to do that instead. I may have to do some of the stuff over cause I had to use the Palm III that is available at the lab instead of the Palm i705 we should be using cause the i705 wouldn't turn on when I tried it. At least my teacher will be in the lab tomorrow so I can ask her about it.

I have to read the novel I bought for history class, In The Time of the Butterflies, by next Monday to post on that. I started reading it today and got to chapter 8, which means I am more than halfway done. I'll probably be able to finish it by tomorrow, which would be great. I read it mostly this morning while waiting for my videos--the X.A.N.A. Attack Progression one, two Winx Club ones, and a W.I.T.C.H. one--to save. I also read it while at work before I had to clock in.

More than likely my group for the Drug and Alcohol Project will have to present tomorrow. But our PowerPoint is good to go and I have notecards written for my part and my outline done. So I'm not too nervous about that, unless while presenting I make a complete fool of myself.

Piano is my "thorn in the flesh" right now. I have quickly learned from this class that God more than likely has no plans for me to be a musician. I do not have the gift. My note reading continues to be disastrous and my discipline for practicing at home pretty much non-existent. Now I find out that I have to play the C Major Scale for Professor Chang (my piano teacher) next Tuesday on the grand piano we're playing our pieces for the final on, and I am all thumbs as far as that's concerned. As long as that's so, playing my chosen piece (Brahms's Lullaby) will be very hard.

I have progressed in my career/major research, weeding out the ones from the lists I made that didn't look like they would work. I now need to research those more in depth and narrow things down. All I know for certain right now is I still want to be a writer, since I feel God is calling me to that.

Speaking of writing, I am writing again, finally. I am writing a fantasy novel as part of the May version of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo for short) being held on the writers' forum I'm a member of. (I say "May version" because the regular NaNoWriMo takes place in November). It is a novel set in the world of Walden which I have already written three short stories about (one of which I lost, unfortunately...however, as compensation, I am putting the principal players of that story -- the dwelves Argus and Alan--into this story). I am writing it in one of the nice notebooks my parents gave me for Valentine's Day, and I also bought a composition notebook for me to write background notes in. So far I have written entries on the geography of Walden, a race of half-animal, half-humanesque (since some of them are elves and other non-mankind races) people called the Kannarah, and a really long essay on the peoples of Walden. Like Tolkien, I want to know as much about my world as possible. I have created some bits of an elven language in naming certain things. Nothing like Tolkien's Herculean effort in creating Quenya and Sindarin (his two elvish tongues) not to mention all the other languages of Middle-Earth (though the Rohirrim language I think is basically Old English, so he may not have invented that one, per se).

I shall have to write some stuff about Chaimvin, the "life-friend," who is more or less God in Walden. He has various "manservants" and "maidservants" under him. I haven't quite determined who they are. In a sense they are like angels, and at the same time I also get a sense of a kind of status difference similar to the status difference between Eru Ilúvatar and the other Ainur/Valar. At any rate though they are not gods and not equal in status to Chaimvin. Chaimvin is God and no one else is. Naturally, coming from a monotheistic Christian family, one would expect me to do this, but if so, you should read my "Notes on the worship of Sitaka and the other deities of Zeta Andromedae." The title by itself suggests polytheism, and the "notes" go on to describe, in classic mythological fashion, the family of gods worshiped by the citizens of Zeta Andromedae.

I am not certain how these servants of Chaimvin came to be. I don't want to have them be made of something in heaven, for that lies dangerously close to the origin of the djinn in Islam (Allah made them in heaven from smoke and fire). Yet the Bible gives us no insight on the creation of the angels other than men were created a little lower than them.

I do have a sort of Satan figure in the form of the rebellious servant Marek and his followers though.

Anyway, back to careers...

Oh wait there's not really anything to say...

Oh crud it's almost midnight. How did that happen?

Oh hey good news and bad news for Amazing Race and American Idol tonight. On Amazing Race, MoJo (Joseph and Monica) got voted off and that's good cause I don't like them since they fight too much. This puts the hippies, the frat boys, and Ray and Yolanda in the finals. The hippies must've gotten a Fast Forward or something cause when the frat boys stepped in at the Pit Stop they were team #2. (I missed most of the show cause they moved it to Wednesday night from 8-9 and I have to work till 8:15). On Idol, Chris Daughtry was voted off...big surprise since people kept saying he'd go all the way and probably even win. Stupid Elliott Yamin is still on there...he is so dopey and not really that great of a singer. Well at least Katherine McPhee is still safe...I voted for her twice last night in hopes the extra vote would pull more weight after she got bad reviews from the judges last night. But, I mean, c'mon, you're making the girl sing Elvis for goodness sake. Like Simon said, she's at a disadvantage already. Even though she did good with old songs with "Great American Songbook" week with Rod Stewart, I mean, this is Elvis Presley we're talking about. Plus she sang a combo of "All Shook Up" and "You Ain't Nothin' But a Hound Dog" for her first song. And everybody knows that hound dog song even if they hate Elvis. She did better with "Can't Help Falling in Love With You," which was more her style.

If that girl wins, or even if she gets runner-up and still makes an album, I'm gonna buy it. I think even if she gets second she will be able to have a career...I mean look at Clay Aiken.

I'm gonna go. Good night.