Sunday, February 27

Oscar Sunday! It was a pretty lazy day leading up to the big show, and about the biggest accomplishment I made was finally sitting down to do some budgeting for my Study Abroad trip to the UK. I hashed over the figures with my parents on the phone, and, assuming that I’m accepted into the program, it’s looking like we’ll be able to make this work. So, I’m totally psyched at this point, and now the next step is making sure that my application is turned in by Tuesday at the International Center. Anyway, Stefy and I settled down for the Oscars with a nice Papa John’s pizza at around 7, and watched the whole thing. We filled out an Oscar ballot before the show even started, and I think there only ended up being one or two categories that one of us didn’t pick—all that EW reading finally comes in handy I guess. I really enjoyed Chris Rock as a host, and I was particularly amazed that they managed to finish the show by 11:30 for the first time in recent memory. All in all it was the most enjoyable Academy Awards night in years, but I’m still disappointed that “SIDEWAYS” didn’t pull out an upset. I am NOT drinking any fucking Merlot!

Saturday, February 26

There were a lot of reasons for spending the night at my dad’s house last night. Being home for pancake morning was definitely one of them. My old man seriously makes the best pancakes, so it was nice to fill up before I got my day going. I pretty much ate and ran, since I had to meet up with Stef later in the morning to run some errands for her friend Danielle’s surprise birthday party. I picked up Miss Spiro from the dorm at around noon, and we made a stop at Meijer on the way up to Eastwood for a quick bite of lunch. We came back to the apartment to kill some time this afternoon, and pretty much ended up lounging around reading this week’s EW. It was close to 6 by the time we left for the dorm, and I just waited downstairs while Stef and her girlfriends finished getting ready before coming down to leave for Danielle’s party. I guess they did another surprise party for Danielle last year, and her mom wanted to see if she could pull off two in a row. We all met for dinner at Mongolian Barbecue, and Danielle’s pseudo-boyfriend managed to bring her to the restaurant once we were all there. It was actually a lot of fun, and everyone seemed to have a really great time. I was kinda surprised myself that they’d managed to keep this a secret for a second straight year, but Stef did a good job of orchestrating the whole thing. We all went back to the dorm for a little bit after our fantastic dinner to open presents. Everyone was getting ready to go out bowling at the Union afterwards, but Stefy and I managed to duck out for the night. We came back to the pad to settle down for a low-key evening, and just ended up watching a pretty mediocre SNL on TV before cashing in.

Friday, February 25

It was a rather hectic Friday like usual. I had deposits to worry about, but the big headache of the day was the stupid audit letters I’ve been working on for about the last two months. There was actually some decent progress made though, so I really can’t complain. The only excitement this morning came when I went up to Panopolous to get my hair cut at 10. Angie was finishing up a client when I walked in, and she apologized for running behind, and asked if I could stay. I obliged, but after I sat down with my Time Magazine, I realized that the woman sitting next to me still hadn’t gone yet, so I ended up waiting about a half hour to finally get in the hot seat. This was pretty much my last chance to get a trim before the Florida trip though, so I didn’t have much choice but to wait. Anyway, I split out of the office at around 3:30, and got a quick oil change on the way to my dad’s. I started a quick load of laundry at the house before we all piled into Sherry’s car to head up to St. Casmir for the fish fry. The food was pretty typical—very greasy, but pretty tasty. We took our time eating, and got back to the house by 7 or 7:30. I pretty much spent the rest of the night doing laundry and playing with the girls. Once everyone went to bed I finally got a chance to pop in my dad’s Ren & Stimpy DVD, and knocked off about four episodes in a row. God, I forgot how disgusting and hysterical that show was, but I just love it. Yes sir, I like it!

Thursday, February 24

My Film History class was cancelled for this morning, so it was a nice little perk to get some extra sleep time. Since my dad couldn’t make lunch work today, and since things are still kind of hectic at the office, I went into work for a few hours this afternoon to do some more work on our audit letters. Of course, it didn’t help that Wanda and I had to contend with MORE computer problems today, but we managed to work around it. The big news from today started taking shape early in the afternoon while I was still at work though. I got an email from the English advisor that there were still a lot of openings left in the Study Abroad program to London this summer, and that got my head spinning. This is pretty much the last chance I’ll have to do Study Abroad at MSU, and I’ve really wanted to do this program for a while now. It would be for about five weeks from the middle of July to the middle of August, and I could take up to 10 credits while I was there. The classes sound great, one of the profs is the guy who taught my criticism class last semester, we’re going on a bunch of really cool field trips, and another big perk is that it’s during Stefy’s Study Abroad program that’s also in London at the same time. At this point I’m trying not to get my hopes up, but after emailing my former professor, he basically assured me that I’d be accepted into the program if I get my application in by Tuesday. The only real question mark now is how I can swing this financially, but at this point I’m thinking that I’ll make this work one way or another. We’ll see! Anyway, my afternoon at Film Theory was pretty decent today. We watched our second Sergei Eisenstein film in a row, “Alexander Nevsky”, and this one was MUCH more enjoyable that “Battleship Potemkin” from last week. So, I was already in a pretty decent mood by the end of class, and things got even better when Prof. Fay handed back our first papers from earlier in the semester—I got a good ol’ 3.5. I split out right after she handed the papers back, and made my way back to the apartment to get ready for the basketball game. The game was a lot of fun tonight (the last one Stef and I will be able to go to this season because we’re out of town for the last home game), and it was especially nice to finally close one out against those pesky Badgers. And what about Alan Anderson throwing up 26 points tonight, salvaging his manhood after six straight losses to Wisconsin as a Spartan? Pretty damn impressive performance. Anyway, that’s it for today. I’ll try to keep information coming as I find out more about Study Abroad—cross your fingers for me!

Wednesday, February 23

Well, with everybody finally back in the office, things certainly picked up at work today. We’re in that pre-audit phase right now, with everybody starting to freak out about getting everything in order for when our accountants come to check the books, so you can guess how exciting that is. My afternoon session of English Literature was more enjoyable than usual today, because we had a group presentation that was actually—gasp—fun. The topic for the week was this morality play from the early 16th Century, “Everyman”. I barely skimmed the reading, but this group did a really good job of explaining things, and they definitely helped perk things up with a game they had us all play, and a bunch of movie clips they had us watch. I didn’t have to resort to my usual Tetris playing routine until AFTER the group was done, and the prof was back up front running the class—it was actually pretty great though, because I set a new high score! Anyway, the early part of my evening was pretty uneventful, but it was certainly nice to have some down time before what will probably be a pretty hectic week before spring break. All I did was make myself some dinner, watch some Curb, and read my EW—it doesn’t get much lazier. I eventually ventured out to bring Stefy over to the pad to watch some “Sex and the City” on TBS, but that was pretty much it for today.

Tuesday, February 22

Film History midterm this morning—blech! I filled a freakin’ bluebook, so I was pretty pooped after two solid hours of writing, but I actually feel pretty good about how I did. I’m just glad that’s over with though. My short day at the office was pretty busy early on showing off the new newsletter to everybody, but things slowed down when I couldn’t access our server for the second day in a row. I think it’s time to get Xserve. Anyway, my afternoon session of Film Theory wasn’t particularly stimulating because the prof lectured for about two and a half hours, but it wasn’t too painful, and I guess all we have left for Thursday now is our weekly screening, so that’ll be easy. I came back to the pad tonight and did a whole lot of nothing. I watched some Curb, updated events, and that was pretty much it. God I’m ready for Florida.

Monday, February 21

One, two, three, four, five… SIX MONTHS! I can’t believe it, but today was already my six-month anniversary with Stefanie. It’s amazing how fast the time has passed, but we’ve managed to pack a lot of stuff into these first six months together. My day started painfully early though because I had a quiz in Sociology, so it took me a while to perk up, but since I got out of class way early I had plenty of time to finish running the errands I needed to make to take care of presents and whatnot. My day at the office was particularly uneventful today because everyone was in Detroit for a staff meeting, and I couldn’t get anything done on our server. I managed to keep busy enough finishing our newsletter though, so it wasn’t a total waste. Anyway, I split out of there about an hour earlier than usual so I could make a stop by B/A florist to pick up out a nice bouquet for my Stefy. After making a quick stop by the pad to wrap some presents, I made a surprise stop to Holmes to drop off the flowers and give Stef a ride to class, so everything worked out really well. My English Lit class this afternoon was actually pretty decent because the prof had planned enough to, you know… TEACH. He let us out waaaay early though, so I killed some time out in the hall with some more Tetris on my iBook—I think I’m addicted all over again. Stefy finally got out of her IAH class at about 4:40, and we made a quick stop by the apartment before heading up to Eastwood so we could do our little gift exchange. My girl gave me another new mix CD, another brand new Hollister shirt, and two of the sweetest cards she’s ever given me. Stef really seemed to like the stuff I got her too—a book of Shakespeare sonnets, a box of the iPod socks, a headphone splitter (for our trip to Florida, and some Victoria’s Secret lip balm. After our gift exchange it was time to run up to Eastwood for the requisite P.F. Chang’s fix, and the timing worked out well so there wasn’t any wait. Our meals were fantastic (like usual), and we decided to cap off our huge dinners with a stop by Krispy Kreme on the way home. Both of us had a ton of studying to do tonight, so I pretty much just took Stef back to the dorm after our night out. I got to spend the rest of the night studying for my Film History exam tomorrow, so it was pretty much downhill after dinner, but it was still a pretty fantastic day overall. Happy Anniversary, Miss Kapowski!