Travel Vlog: Dunning Jobs and Getting Healthy

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Look at this happy baby! One of my sister’s guests used to make balloon twisting art, so Owen got a fancy birthday hat.
I was going to talk about this in the video too, but I’m pretty sure I totally forgot. During spring break, I had taken my car in to the Ford dealership in Austin because it was still having the same problems that were supposedly supposed to be fixed with the recall last year. For dumb reasons, that dealership wasn’t able to diagnose the problem because the technician who specialized in the code they got from the car was out sick. So I left my car in Brenham since spring break so that my parents could take it to the dealership, so that I wouldn’t have to deal with not having a car if the Escape needed to be left there. I’ve been borrowing my mom’s Hyundai Elantra in the meantime. I used to drive that car when I was in high school, so it was pretty interesting to see how the car had aged in that time.
And he hulked out in the process.
Owen totally demolished his smash cake.

Anyway, the issue with my Ford Escape was actually with a sensor that is responsible for gas being pumped to the engine when the gas pedal is depressed. I’ve been pretty skeptical of my car ever being actually “fixed” considering my past experience with taking it to the dealership and getting it back “fixed”, but I immediately noticed a difference in the way it drove on the way back to Dallas today. Before, you’d feel a noticeable lurch whenever the car was shifting gears, but today it was hardly noticeable, and it didn’t hesitate in accelerating/switching gears like it used to. It felt really nice to be driving my Escape again — I didn’t realize I’d miss it haha.

750 Words: Work Stress

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This is about 23 hours of work on my nephew’s blanket. One ball of yarn out of the 3 that I bought for it, so the finished product should be about three times this length.

I’ve always found it difficult to make posts about mundane little details of my life, which is partly also the reason why I have trouble making daily posts. However, I saw two posts on my Tumblr dashboard that were basically lists of questions that followers could choose for the poster to answer, so I copied a few of them into a word doc to use as topics for these 750 Word posts. Maybe I’ll aim for 2 posts a week and work my way up during the year, ’cause once a day is too much of a commitment for me right now lol.

In other news, apparently this past week has been pretty stressful on me. I opened every day that I worked last week, and only one of those days was with an associate who’s been at our store for more than a month. Two of those days was with a manager from another store who was helping us out since we have only one associate at our store who can open during the week, and she was gone on vacation. It was nice though, since the other manager was able to show me how to do more of the paperwork and stuff for the store. The last day, we borrowed an associate from another store, and the closing manager from the day before forgot to do the computer stuff so that the associate could clock in and had the correct register permissions and whatnot. I vaguely remembered how to do it from when I helped out another store, but in the end, I still had to call the help desk.

Speaking of the help desk, I had to call them pretty much every day that I worked last week because we kept having issues with our coupon codes not working properly on our registers. I’ve gotten the same tech support person practically every time I’ve called, which feels a little weird. I guess we only have a handful of tech support people for the stores in our region? It’s the only plausible reason I can think of for me getting the same person that many times in a row.

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Here’s the picture from last summer, after I had worked on it for about 13 hours.

I didn’t realize how stressed I was until I saw the schedule for this week and just raged. First of all, I’m scheduled for 26 hours this week, when I specifically requested for a max of 20 hours. Secondly, I’m scheduled to open again on Thursday for the few hours before my class starts because I’m the only associate who consistently has opening availability on Thursday. And thirdly, two of my shifts are with new associates. I just dislike that they schedule me with new people when I’m still new at my position. It’s frustrating that most of our associates only have closing availability, so I’ll probably be stuck opening on Thursday for a while until we hire someone who has opening availability. At least our new store manager is done with training, so he’s working at our store starting this week.

I actually raged so hard that I cried after I clocked out on Friday. I’m stuck on campus from 1:00 PM – 9:45 PM on Tuesdays, and even though I only have a class for just over an hour on Thursdays, I still consider it a “class day”. Being scheduled on Wednesdays and Fridays makes it difficult to read ahead for class, or even review stuff for class, since work mentally tires me out so much. So the days that I actually have off from work and don’t have class are mostly spent catching or keeping up with classes, making it feel like I don’t get much time to just relax. So that, and the fact that they disregarded my max availability really irks me. Additionally, my parents are visiting this weekend, so I’ll probably be spending a good deal of my free time cleaning my apartment. I’ve actually been wanting to clean my apartment for a while, but I’d need at least a day to do all of it, and since I’ve been using my days off to study, I haven’t been able to get to it.

I dunno. It doesn’t sound quite as complicated when I explain it, but I guess it feels really stressful to me since my time management skills are still pretty crappy. That, and a whole bunch of new stuff was thrown at me this past week.

Well, on the plus side, I worked on the blanket I’m knitting for my nephew, and I’ve been rereading the Harry Potter series before bed since I don’t have any of my portable game systems to play on lol. I’m already on the fourth book in the series even though I’ve been trying to limit myself to only one or two chapters a night. Then again, the first three books are kinda short — and I also binge read a few times last week when I was feeling frustrated and unmotivated to do anything requiring effort.

Somehow, I can’t believe it’s already February, but I also can’t believe that it’s only February.

750 Words: Still in School! Work Promotion! Resolutions!

I’m not sure where to start on this one. The last post was written right before all my final exams and papers. I somehow managed to get two A’s and one B- for my classes from last semester, but that left me with a cumulative GPA of 2.959, which was just under the 3.0 I needed to get out of academic probation.

My bro-in-law and I both got our backpacks from Goodwill. xD
This girl has the exact same backpack as I do. My brother-in-law also has the same backpack.

In undergrad at UTD, if you get into academic probation and aren’t able to get out of it within 2 semesters, there are a few other levels of probation and whatnot before you get dismissed from the university. However, in grad school, all you get is the one chance. So the second half of my December and the first few weeks of January was spent worrying about whether or not my adviser would be able to convince the Dean of Graduate Studies to not kick me out of the master’s program.

Luckily, he did, and I’m about to start the third week of classes. One of my friends also made me give him my 3DS and PSP for the semester, so hopefully I’ll be able to keep my shit together. Speaking of my 3DS, I bought Etrian Odyssey sometime at the end of December when it was on sale for $15, and somehow managed to put over 40 hours into it before giving my 3DS to my friend after the first week of classes.

I started working at NY&C again 2 weeks ago and made sure they made a note of not scheduling me for more than 20 hours/week. The first week, I probably worked somewhere between 25-30 hours, but that’s fine since classes were just starting up and I wanted to earn money to make up for not working for over a month lol.This past week, they scheduled me for 15, but then I got randomly promoted to management support associate (MSA), so I picked up another 5 hours or so from being trained on opening and closing the store. I get a $1.50 pay raise that should come into effect this week, and tomorrow will be my first time to open the store.

The company decided to remove some job positions (namely, part-time assistant manager) and add others (floor sales leader, pretty much same thing as assistant manager but with less pay and more restricted hours, I guess). Considering that my store has been undergoing management changes pretty much since I started working, and that we’ve been shorthanded in general, this change came at a bad time; I’m guessing that had a lot to do with me getting a promotion. Speaking of which, MSA is a temporary promotion, and I go back to being a regular sales associate once we get a full management team back.

The crappy part is that they’re having me open on Tuesday and Thursday this week from 9:30 – 12 (when I have class at 1), so they’re really desperate. I hope that this doesn’t become a trend, otherwise I’ll change my availability to where I can’t work on Tuesdays and Thursdays at all. Another crappy thing is that we lost one of our part-time managers because she decided the demotion to floor sales leader ($4 decrease in pay) wasn’t worth it, and took the severance package instead.

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I’m trying out this work organizer thing that came with last year’s organizer. I read so many things today! @_@

I’m not really sure what else I have to talk about. I have no idea how people can work all day and then get home and study for classes, though. I’m so mentally drained after working a full shift that I can’t do any studying unless it’s something menial. And since my classes mainly require reading, that means I just don’t study more often than not.

I’ve been getting up and going to sleep earlier and on a fairly regular basis since starting work at NY&C again, and also classes. I enjoy it, but I also wish it were easier to actually get up in the mornings. It probably would be easier if I had something to eat for breakfast. Speaking of which, I still need to go buy some groceries. Better wrap up this super-fragmented blog post quickly. It’s already 8 PM and I should be in bed by teeeeeeeeeeennnnn.

To end things, I guess I could list my vague new year’s resolutions here, since I did think of a few. I usually make any, since I’m of the school of thought that people should continually trying to improve themselves, so I guess this is more of me writing out goals I’ve been working towards, but in a more concrete/detailed way. I should probably write them down and tape them to my monitor so I see them daily, but meh, maybe later.

2015 New Year’s Resolutions:

  • Make fewer impulse purchases
    • Make fewer *large* impulse purchases
    • Short-term goal: limit to one impulse purchase a month
    • Update budget regularly
      • When getting paycheck
      • When making purchases
      • Reconcile w/bank statement @ beginning of month
    • Fewer purchases = moar $$$
      • For food
      • For bills, credit cards
      • For financial buffer
      • For THE FUTURE
  • Keep up with classes
    • Read chapters before class
    • Review class notes & personal chapter notes weekly
    • Update planner w/study timelines for upcoming assignments
  • Use planner regularly
    • Class assignments/exams
    • Work schedules
    • Meal plans
      • Also helps with eating more healthily
    • Bills
  • Blog more regularly
    • 750 Words
      • Such work
      • Much time
    • ???
    • ?????
    • ???????????????

750 Words – Hyperbolic Crochet

I haven’t been keeping up very well with these “daily” 750 word posts, have I? During Thanksgiving week and the following week, I had myself checked into the inn on HRPG so that’s the main reason why I haven’t been posting. I also changed the “750 Word post” daily task to “work on blog/750 words”, so I sometimes (often) cheat by considering updates and comment moderation as “working on the blog”, even though those usually take less than a minute or so. In any case, I haven’t been doing anything particularly noteworthy  . . . and I also just didn’t feel like making a completely random brain dump post. I know these types of posts are supposed to be uncensored and free-flowing thoughts, but I still prefer my posts to have at least some type of focus and structure.

Mine doesn’t look very coral-like . . . I think it’s because of the Christmas-y colors.

I probably won’t be posting these daily starting from now, either; I’ve got finals and papers due next week, and then I’ll be visiting family for winter break (plus my parents don’t have internet), so I might instead type up little blurbs each day and post whenever it reaches 750 words/I feel like it.

So I came across this thing called hyperbolic crochet. I actually discovered it from a Kickstarter that is showcasing them as stress balls, but I think hyperbolic crocheting was popularized as a way to raise awareness concerning environmental issues while at the same time paying homage to the beauty of coral reefs. (See more coral-like crocheted versions here.) I have a few balls of yarn that I impulse bought because I felt like knitting/crocheting quick and easy things for instant gratification — and as a way to take a break from the yarn projects that I was working on for other people — so making little crocheted coral stress balls seemed like a quick and easy way to use up that yarn. It is rather stress-relieving to toy with, but I was also pleased to discover that it’s really simple to make as well.

I learned how to crochet before learning how to knit, but I much prefer knitting over crochet. It’s easier to keep track of stitches since they’re always on a needle, I like that the resulting fabric is stretchier and less stiff, and it’s easier to knit by touch than it is to crochet by touch (knitting/crocheting without having to constantly look at your work, if that didn’t make sense). It’s easier for me to space out and watch videos or shows while knitting, which makes it more relaxing and enjoyable. On the other hand, with crochet you typically have only one loop/stitch on your hook at a time, and sometimes it’s difficult for me to tell which stitch to work in — plus I have to count stitches at the end of each round/row to make sure that I have the right number. And when I’m off by one or a few stitches, I’m usually unsure of whether it’s from me just being ADHD and herping up when I was counting, or if I’m actually missing stitches. So counting (and often recounting) rounds is tedious and frustrating when I have to tear out the previous round because I was off, and has a high potential of devolving into a frustrating cycle because I don’t pay close enough dsafdsafsdffsdto where the previous round ends.

Does my desktop background look familiar?
Got a vertical notebook riser so that I have marginally more desk space!!! :D

The beauty of hyperbolic crochet is that I don’t have to keep count of stitch count nor number of rounds. The pattern is based off a simple repeat, and it doesn’t matter if I miss a stitch or forget where in the repeat I am because it’ll look delightfully convoluted regardless. It’s practically impossible to mess up, so with this pattern, I’m able to enjoy crocheting to the same extent that I do knitting. It’s an easy and simple project that I can pick up and put down without having to keep track of how far along I am because I can make it as big or small as I want. The only downside is that there’s not much point in me making multiple stress corals for myself, and I probably have enough yarn to where I’d make way more than I have friends and family to randomly gift them to. I suppose larger ones that I make can be replacement bath loofahs. (Image for those of you unfamiliar with the term lolz.)

The only other thing I know I wanted to mention is that I got a notebook riser for my laptop to increase the screen height and (hopefully) reduce neck strain from sitting in front of it for so long. I finally have some desk space in front of my laptop so that I can write things in my planner or random notes! My desk doesn’t feel so cramped now haha. Plus my cat can’t sit on my laptop keyboard anymore, and him sitting on my desk will no longer obstruct my view of the screen. However, I don’t mention this because of the increased potential in my productivity, but because of the herp solution I came up with in figuring out how to raise my external monitor to approximately the same height.

Monitor Solutions
I tried to camouflage the herpery with nerdery. Did it work?

I’m not sure how noticeable it is in the other picture, but I took a closer one so that you could see exactly what I’m using to prop up my monitor — 2 empty daily vitamin bottles and an empty bottle from one of my past Adderall prescriptions. It’s not the stablest setup, but at least my desk is up against a corner so I don’t have to worry as much about it potentially falling back off of my desk.

THIS ALSO MEANS I HAVE MORE ROOM TO EAT STUFF AT MY DESK WHILE WATCHING STUFF ON THE INTERNETS. It just feels more spacious, less cramped, more enjoyable. I have more room to do stuff without having had to drastically change the layout of my work area.

Aaaanyway, I’ve already spent over 2 hours on this post and it’s time for bed. Hopefully I won’t be tossing and turning in my bed for hours tonight — it’s been a while since I’ve taken my Adderall regularly, so it’s making it difficult to fall asleep even though I take it at 6 in the morning.

750 Words – Mind Maps & Persona Q

It’s been a few months since you’ve seen one of these, huh? I didn’t realize the 750 Words post I made was in July. Lol! I just realized that I kept up with those for only a week before starting “The Ones Who Matter” series, so I didn’t really establish much of a routine before messing it up, anyway. I guess since it’s been a while since my last post talking about things going on in my life, I’ll do a quick recap of the past few months.

  • I got a job at New  York & Company
  • My nephew was baptized and I’m now his godmother.
  • One of my older cousins got married and had a suuuuuuuuuuper fancy wedding reception.
  • I went clubbing for the first time.
These are my notes for one of my Systems Neuro chapters. I think this is the first time I’ve *ever* taken notes while reading a textbook. I’ve only ever taken notes in class.

I think that about covers all the big events. Otherwise my life has been pretty much the same as past semesters: trying to figure out how I study best, trying not to procrastinate, trying to eat healthy, trying not to fail classes. The usual. I’ve been using this program called XMind for the past month or so, and I think it’s the best method I’ve found so far. For those of you unfamiliar with the term, “mind mapping” is a diagramming method for visually organizing information around a concept. I like using the computer program rather than pen and paper because:

  1. I’m not limited to the physical dimensions of a piece of paper
  2. I can paste images from my book into my mind maps
  3. I type faster than I write
  4. I don’t have to keep up with physical pieces of paper
  5. I can rearrange things in my maps later on if I feel like it
  6. Mind mapping is kinda fun, and the above-mentioned benefits of using a computer program increase the fun-ness, which makes me slightly more motivated to study if I’m able to use it

I’m only using the free version right now, but if I continue to use it next semester and see a positive effect on my studying habits, then I might consider purchasing a license for it for the additional features.

Persona 4 screenshot
The characters are one of the reasons I love Persona 3 and 4.

Anyway, what I really wanted to talk about in this post is the Persona game being released this coming Tuesday for the Nintendo 3DS. After playing Persona 3 Portable last year, it pretty much instantly became my favorite game, so one major reason that I want to buy it is for nostalgia’s sake. Persona Q: Shadow of the Labrynth (click for a review about the game) originally wasn’t very high on my wishlist, but after watching a stream of the gameplay on the Atlus Twitch channel last week, I got so excited that I impulse pre-ordered the game. Now here I am a few days later, trying to be a responsible adult by talking myself out of my pre-order. Let’s do a quick pros and cons list.

Pros (Why I Want It):

  • NOSTALGIA
  • NOSTALGIA
  • NOSTALGIA
  • New map-drawing gameplay from Etrian Odyssey
  • NOSTALGIA

Cons (Why I Shouldn’t Pre-order It):

  • It costs $50 and you should be saving money
  • You have games on all your consoles (PC, PS2, N64, PSP, & 3DS) that you haven’t played/finished
  • There’s always the possibility that it will be on sale in the future (though somewhat unlikely)
  • You wouldn’t be able to play it until the end of the semester anyway (assuming you don’t want to fail your classes and get kicked out of the master’s program)
  • If you pre-ordered it, you would probably start playing it immediately, fail your classes, and get kicked out of the master’s program
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Here, have a random derpy photo of me.

It’s pretty obvious that canceling my pre-order is the right/smart/adult choice to make, but it’s difficult ignoring the screaming fangirl inside of me, even if denying her this game is only temporary. It’s a good thing I started using my budget program again, otherwise I’d probably lose the battle to my inner fangirl. I think I’ve managed to compromise with her by agreeing that we can get it once we finish Persona 4, and also pointing out that we can tide ourselves over by playing the feMC route on P3P to completion. This also gives me more motivation to finish P4; I don’t play my console or PC games anywhere near as avidly as I games on my PSP or 3DS. While portability (as in easily taking my games with me whenever I travel) is plays a part, the major reason for this is that I can play games on my PSP and 3DS while laying down on my bed, and am not confined to one position/direction. Maybe if I had more comfortable furniture, this wouldn’t be as big of an issue.

Being a responsible adult sucks.

The Ones Who Matter (Part 7)

At long last, we have come to the final post in this series. This one is cheating a little bit because it’s about my whole family, but I don’t think I have the stamina to continue this series for as long as I would need in order to adequately credit my them for all they’ve done. Considering that they’ve influenced my life since I was born, that’s a huge time period to cover, and I’m sure I’ve been supported in ways that I’m completely unaware of.

Growing up, my cousins were pretty much my friends. Of course, back then we were a lot more bratty to each other than we are now that most of us are 18 and older. Most of my gaming experience prior to college took place at either my grandparents’ house, or at one of my cousins’ houses. Now that I think about it, nearly all of the trips I’ve taken out-of-state have been with the families of at least 2 or 3 cousins. New Mexico and Colorado (for

My family is a bunch of dorks.
My cousin’s wedding had a photo booth + props. These are the cousins I hung out with the most growing up.

 snowboarding and skiing), Disneyworld in Florida, and my last trip to Vietnam are some of the more memorable excursions — and I guess I actually have their parents to thank, both for taking care of the trip plans and also for allowing me to tag along on those few times when my parents didn’t/couldn’t go. Of course, I have my grandparents to thank for coming to the US in the first place, and for raising their children to value family so highly. Without that, I wouldn’t have had a past where I visited my grandparents every weekend, and saw most of my cousins every weekend because they were there to visit the grandparents too.

I’m not exactly sure what to focus on when talking about my parents. They were definitely overprotective, and I feel like that aspect of them played a large part in me not really having friends growing up. But while they were overprotective about me hanging out with people outside of school and emphasized the importance of doing well in school, they gave me a good deal of freedom as well. They let me play whatever sport I wanted, even though my dad didn’t particularly like the possibility of me getting hurt. The classes I took and the colleges I applied to were all my own decision; then again, that freedom might’ve stemmed more from not having much knowledge or experience with American education. My mom was the one who pushed me to get a job during high school. I don’t remember the exact reason for it, but I’m sure it was something related to independence and also to prevent me from spending all my free time at home.

Regardless, they’ve always given me their support. A good deal of it is monetary — my living expenses during undergrad, and now living expenses + tuition during my master’s program. Even though they don’t make much themselves, they never asked me to get a job during undergrad; they wanted me to be able to put all my focus into my classes. Even when I decided to change my career plans, they continued supporting me (albeit with some reluctance and concern regarding financial feasibility and the likelihood of me burning out).

I guess one of the best ways my parents have influenced me is by not limiting my curiosity. As I said before, they let me play any sport I wanted. While they disapproved of excessive gaming, they never got rid of any of my games, or prevented me from getting any. In a way, my mom encouraged it — my curiosity, not my gaming habits — by taking me to the library every week during the summers when I was still in grade school. She cultivated my love for reading, and I only wish I had the time and ability to enjoy all my hobbies to the extent that I want.

I have a feeling my mom had to semi-drag my dad to the photo booth.
I have a feeling my mom had to semi-drag my dad to the photo booth.

While encouraging my curiosity definitely played into my learning how to knit and crochet, I think a larger part of it was appreciating the concept of doing and making things oneself. My dad has built multiple things around the yard (treehouses, chicken coops, a fountain), and my mom taught my sister and me the basics of sewing and embroidery. They grow many of their own vegetables and herbs, and a majority of the meals I ate while growing up were cooked from scratch. Plus they make stuff from memory — no cookbooks or recipes found online, like I have to rely on whenever I try to make something.

My sister and I weren’t very close growing up. Since we were born eight years apart, I’m sure I was an annoying kid that she had to babysit, more often than not. I don’t have many memories of/with her from when I was younger — she moved out for college by the time I was in 4th grade, so I imagine most of what I remember from my childhood is similar to that of an only child. When I switched to the public high school, she gave me a few pointers on classes to take and whatnot, but we didn’t really start becoming close until after I began college. By that time, she’d already saved/earned enough money to build herself a house, so she began inviting me to stay with her during the winter breaks and the summers that I didn’t take classes.

In spite of growing up apart, for the most part, we have similar personalities. We’re introverted, getting cranky if we have to socialize for too long, even if we’re having fun up until that point. We both are pretty big foodies, though I think I got some of it from her. She’s also crafty; last year she made coasters for me and my parents for Christmas. She cooks more than I do, and she almost feels like a second mom whenever I stay with her ’cause I usually just end up eating all of her food and while doing minimal work in preparing meals.

Her husband, Brad, is pretty great too. He’s more into gaming than my sister (she’s only really into WoW), and he’s introduced me to a variety of online games. It’s hard to keep up with him, honestly, since he burns out rather quickly, while I take forever to begin playing any sort of game with consistency. I’m also not used to playing multiplayer games, so I tend not to play them unless I’m playing with him. I’ve probably mentioned this before, but he and my sister actually met through WoW. I feel like it’s one of those stories where things aren’t expected to work and probably shouldn’t, but they do anyway. They were part of the same guild, and apparently Brad originally thought my sister was a guy because he’d make a dirty joke and she’d go along with it. My sister liked his corny humor. Eventually they started talking on the phone, and he moved to Texas to live with my sister about 6 months later. I’m not sure when they started dating, but I feel like it was probably around my junior or senior year of high school. Maybe sometime in 2008? Regardless, they got married last year and had Owen, my adorable nephew, earlier this spring.

By this time of the night, I'd had a few drinks in me, as you can tell by my flushed skin tone.
By this time of the night, I’d had a few drinks in me, as you can tell by my flushed skin tone.

Anyway, in addition to gaming, he also likes to make stuff. He mainly does woodworking, but he’s also pretty handy with a sewing machine, which he proved by making beanbags for this game called “Corn Hole” (aka the bean bag toss). He’s always eager to show me how to do stuff, and in the past has let me help him with fixing up his Jeep. He also showed me how to drive a manual in that Jeep, but it was kinda difficult since my legs could barely reach the pedals.

I have my sister to thank for my parents being more supportive when I decided to change career plans from MD to PhD. After initially making the decision and telling my parents about it, they balked and kept trying to convince me to retake the MCAT so I’d have that score to use as part of a backup plan to go back to premed if I decided that research wasn’t for me. My parents prefer that I call them every night just to let them know that I’m okay and nothing has happened to me, but during that time I didn’t talk to them for at least a week, if not more. Apparently I came up as a topic of conversation during one of their phone calls during that time I withdrew from everything, and she supported my decision to change careers, if that’s what I really wanted to do. I’m sure that a big part of the reason my parents were hesitant back then (and still kinda are now) is because it’s a little difficult for them to understand research as a career. And since their understanding of both the medical field and research field are a bit dated, they’re worried about my job stability and ability to support myself in the future.

Anyway, I’m not exactly sure what my sister said to them, but she was able to allay some of the fears/worries that they had that were stressing me out. Since then, communication among my family has been a bit more open, and we’ve begun talking to each other a bit more often. I’m really thankful that I have such a supportive and (pretty) open-minded family. While I may not talk with them as openly or often as I do with the other people mentioned in this series, I can’t even imagine what my life would be like now had I not had my family to rely on this whole time. It’s thanks to them that I’m able to have such high aspirations for myself, and that I’m in a position to pursue the career I want.

The Ones Who Matter (Part 6)

All right, the way I have things planned, part 7 will be the last post — and I’m about 90% sure it will akshually be the last one. This post was supposed to be the second half of Part 5, but lo and behold, I found enough to say about Nightmaren to warrant them having their own post.

Again, I did not expect a mere phone game to become such an integral part of my life. I haven’t been playing it as intensely since the start of this semester, but I still log on at least once a day.

About 2 years ago, I wrote this post about online friends and how I’d never really made any before, in spite of having tried a few MMOs (which seem to be where a lot of online friends are made). And earlier this spring, I hinted in this post that I had become really close to some of the people in a guild I had joined. I’m still surprised that I began talking in the guild chat pretty freely within such a short period of time. I can only hypothesize that it was easier for me to become comfortable in the guild for the phone game because of the fact that there were only about 15 other members by the time I joined, and out of those, only 6-8 of them frequented the chat room. In comparison, MMO guilds tend to be much larger, and plus there are always other players outside of the guild that are present in the public chat. Even if there’s no interaction with them, I guess it still feels the same as being in a room full of people for me — which just activates my wallflower mode.

But I (kinda) digress. This post is dedicated to Kaili and Tali, the two friends I’ve made in the guild. In spite of us having known each other for only about 8 months, I am as close to them as I am with all the other friends I’ve mentioned in this series. I think this was possible for me because I felt no need to uphold any pretenses given that we were all people who took a phone game a tad too seriously — comparatively, I felt a need to prove my intelligence to the friends I made in college. I don’t know exactly why, aside from the context of meeting in an academic setting.

Regardless, I made Kaili and Tali aware of my shortcomings pretty much from the beginning of our friendship, and I’m sure that a lot of our bonding was a result of us being so open about our own faults. And while we’re all a little low on self-esteem, we’re also pretty good at pointing out when one of us is being too hard on ourselves.

So I just realized that I might be codependent, or have codependent tendencies. I’m pretty sure I used to be, if I’m not anymore — and if so, that’s only thanks to all these friends that I’ve made. Another topic for another post, though I feel like I’ve probably inadvertently touched upon the subject past blogs.

Okay, back to the topic. Kaili and Tali have helped me become more confident in myself over the past few months through various ways. I’d say letting me sing at them for hours over Skype is one of the main ones. Being nonjudgmental of me is one of the others. I feel like snapchat should be included somewhere in this list as well. My mind is having trouble working at the moment.

You know how when you binge on a TV show, book series, manga, or anime, you go on a roller coaster of emotions, but afterwards have trouble remembering exactly what happened? That’s kinda how my friendship with these two feels. I know we’ve been through quite a bit together, but I’m having trouble remembering exactly what the big events were. I’d say that generally, our friendship consists of a lot of ridiculous random conversations, ridiculous random conversations + alcohol, open announcements of bodily functions and other body-related things that are generally taboo in public, and a little anime and video games. Which reminds me, I originally got my 3DS XL because I wanted to do online Pokemon battles with them — and also because I was disappoint that Nightmaren wasn’t able to sell me their PS Vita.

I should've been paid for that work lols.
I got really intense with the guild conquest events for a while. *Really* intense.

The random and ridiculous conversations seem to be a staple of all my friendships. I’m curious as to whether that’s common to close friendships of other people. It seems like an inherent part of close friendships, even if it’s not something that occurs very often. I can’t think of many other ways someone would be able to deem another person a close friend. Then again, I did admit to my brain not being optimally functional at the moment, so I don’t place much weight on my current inability to think of other possibilities.

Of one thing, I am sure — meeting Kaili and Tali gave me some much needed socialization and practice in being more open about myself. They’ve given me the (constant) support and encouragement I needed to start making the bigger life changes in my efforts to find ways to work around my ADHD. In fact, Kaili was the one who told me about Habit RPG, so you indirectly have her to thank for me actually posting semi-regularly this past summer.

Next post is the last one in this series! For srs. After that, we’ll be returning to the daily “750 Words” posts — at least until the next time I have a definite topic I want to cover.

The Ones Who Matter (Part 5)

Geebus, this series has gotten long, but I think we’re finally nearing the end. Part 6 should be the last. At least, I hope it is because this has kinda been exhausting.

Although Nightmaren and I know each other IRL, and have known each other since freshman year of undergrad, they feel more like an internet friend to me. I’d say at least half (if not more) of our communication throughout undergrad was through instant messaging. As such, most of their influence on me deals with how I interact with the internet. I’m pretty sure I have to give them all the credit for me being somewhat able to emulate one of the common dialects of the internet, where letters go missing, and sometimes words too. I don’t do it all that well — it takes a great deal of effort to truly type brokenly — but Nightmaren is a master.

You know, if it weren’t for them, you wouldn’t even be reading this blog right now because it wouldn’t exist. I had a Xanga way back when, but stopped keeping up with it after a few years. The posts on there were also . . . cringe-worthy? I have the posts from that account imported to this blog; they’re just set to private. Maybe one day I’ll make them public, so that you can see how I started and progressed over the years. I may have already given this warning in another post, but a lot of these Xanga posts were bad. There are so many different font colors used, and I’m pretty sure that one post had all the sentences highlighted in random colors.

In any case, after showing me their blog and subsequently finding out that I had blogged in the past, Nightmaren motivated me to start doing it again. Of course, you can see from my blog archive that I haven’t been particularly successful with doing it on a regular basis, but it’s gotten a bit better since the ADHD diagnosis a little over a year and a half ago. Has it already been that long? I know I said it wouldn’t happen quickly, but I feel like I haven’t really made any noteworthy progress at all.

Most of these opportunities presented themselves during MD meetings, since I usually left my laptop unattended as members signed in on it.
If they had access to my laptop, Nightmaren would usually take advantage of the opportunity and make me a sanic wallpaper for my background.

Anyway, whereas Samee and Charlie are the ones who really got me into gaming, Nightmaren was the one who got me to streaming. Not that I do that very often, nor does anyone watch me, but hey, it’s gotten me to interact more with people on the internet . Meaning ones that I don’t already know IRL. Because that has pretty much been the extent of my experience up until this past spring. But I’ll get into that later.

While most of the things I associate with Nightmaren are related to the internet, they also had a singularly grand impact on me in person as the president of Molding Doctors during our senior year of undergrad. Before that year, this organization was rather lackluster, and one of those types that you were a member of mainly so that you could put it on your med school application (back when that was still my goal). I remember that meeting during which they had officer elections — there couldn’t have been more than 10 people, and half of those were running for officer positions. At first, I was probably only glad for Nightmaren winning the presidency because they were my friend. Then, once our senior year started, I was glad because they pretty much completely revamped the way the organization’s events and meetings were conducted, which made it much more energetic and enjoyable.

I should mention now that Nightmaren really enjoys trolling people. They also have an innate flair for it, and make use of it daily. Now, I realize the traditional (urbandictionary) definition of a troll has a negative connotation, and that nowadays someone might accuse someone of being a troll simply for saying or doing something that they don’t agree with. But Nightmaren isn’t either of those types of trolls. After a while of scrolling through the various definitions of a “troll” on urbandictionary, the following one is the closest description to what Nightmaren does.

“Trolling is a hobby in the same vein as prank phone calls, and the true objective of trolling is to be clever and creative in getting a reaction out of the troll victims.”

Let me tell you, Nightmaren is particularly ingenious. Prior to that year, Molding Doctors held a suture clinic every spring for their members to partake in as the “big event” of the year. It was pretty much the only thing they had for attracting new members. Well, Nightmaren created a new event — a mock interview day that a limited number of members could participate in. We recruited faculty and students to act as interviewers, a variety of interview types for the members to experience, and then at the end of the event, they got to keep their evaluation folder so that they could look over the comments the interviewers had made about them. It was a very professional and successful event — and its conception stemmed from Nightmaren’s desire to draw sanics. To truly appreciate the masterpiece that is the SANIC event, read Nightmaren’s post: Life in the F4s L4n3!1 I never expected be an accomplice to one of their trolls; I guess it’s just a testament to their charisma that I enjoyed and am prideful of having helped create an event centered around something that has haunted me ever since I became friends with Nightmaren.

It wasn’t until my first year of grad school — when I was vice president of Molding Doctors — that I could truly appreciate how good of a leader Nightmaren is. By comparing him to Nightmaren, I was able to better identify exactly what it was that made Nightmaren a good leader. I had three full paragraphs about how fail this president was, but this post is supposed to be about Nightmaren, so let’s just leave it at that. Just know that my experience with last year’s president was so frustrating that I just lost all interest in the organization, even though Nightmaren’s younger brother is the president this year (and was secretary last year).

Now, as a result of being friends of Nightmaren and working with them closely through Molding Doctors, I have been subjected to a daily dose of trolling pretty much since the day I first started getting to know them. Thanks to that, I’ve become a bit more tolerant of herpness, as well as (slightly) more likely to partake in any herp activities going on within my vicinity. I suppose I also have to thank Balance for the same reason (though to a lesser extent), since they have aided Nightmaren in administering additional amounts of herp. Many of the webcomics I now follow were discovered by Nightmaren linking me to a particularly herp one. Some examples include: exocomics, GamerCat, and Twogag.

Honestly, Nightmaren’s aptitude for herp goes beyond what I could ever convey through words. It’s something that has to be experienced (ideally firsthand) to be truly understood. And while I’m sure I’ve left out quite a few things I’ve gained from my friendship with them, herp makes up about 95% of our interactions, so it’s a bit difficult to remember what else there is beyond it.

Also, I lied. There will probably be 2 more posts in this series. I hope only 2 more posts.

DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN.

The Ones Who Matter (Part 4)

Considering that I’ve made 9 posts this summer alone, this HRPG definitely is doing something — you have to admit that’s rather impressive considering that I averaged 8-9 posts a year up until now.

 Of the 3 friends I made during undergrad, last but not least is Charlie. He was actually one of the people who lived in the apartment right next to David, Cameron, and Samee; if I recall correctly, Cameron and David had met Charlie and one of his roommates at some welcome week event during the first week of the semester, or had gone to an event together because they happened to leave their apartments at the same time — in any case, I met Charlie through them. Charlie and Samee were also roommates from sophomore to senior year, and their apartment became the “hangout spot” for the four of us.

This is the only picture that I have from undergrad of the three of them together.

I remember getting the four of them — Cameron, Charlie, Samee, and Charlie’s roommate — nerf guns for Christmas so they could play together. That wording sounds kinda weird, and now that I think about it, it was probably pretty unusual to get these three people Christmas gifts when I’d only known them for three or four months. I think I also made birthday cakes. I’m not sure if these gestures were more from the “goodness of my heart”, or more from an attempt to ensure that they continued to have an interest in hanging out with me. I do remember buying the nerf guns on impulse because I was pretty sure that they’d have a ton of fun pelting each other with foam bullets for at least one night. I dunno. I like seeing people happy as a result of something I did.

I feel like I know Charlie the least. Due to circumstances explained in previous posts, I got to know Cameron and Samee fairly well as individuals during freshman year. With Charlie, I only ever saw him in a group setting. In addition to that, he’s a pretty quiet and stoic person, so altogether it made getting to know him rather difficult. Honestly, I’m still not quite sure what he thinks of me beyond the fact that we’re friends. For example, if Samee were to briefly describe me to a non-mutual friend, it would probably be something along the lines of “herp and fat.” Cameron’s would likely have something about neuroscience, music, or over-thinking things. I have literally no idea how Charlie would describe me, or what kind of impression I’ve had on him.

Whereas I alternated between relying on Cameron and Samee for moral support during undergrad, Charlie has helped me during this first year of grad school. Samee and Cameron both moved away for med school (though Samee is just barely an hour away), while Charlie and I both stayed to do our master’s degrees. I’m not sure how much their leaving impacted Charlie, but I’ll be honest — I was kinda devastated. The academic shift between undergrad and grad school was as jarring as the shift between high school and college, I had a harrowing end to a romantic relationship, a sudden interest in research — and as a result, a struggle to decide if I truly wanted to be a doctor, or if I would be better suited and happier as a researcher/professor — and I’d lost my primary sources of moral support. I know I didn’t lose them — they’re still my friends and we still talk a lot — but distance certainly puts a damper on things. Charlie has a few other friends here, but those three were pretty much all I had during undergrad. I won’t lie; it’s been a pretty lonely year, and just thinking about it for too long can make me cry.

This past spring, both Samee and Cameron managed to visit at the same time.

Anyway, Charlie and I have hung out more over this past year. I feel like I haven’t gotten to know him that much better than I did before; most of what we do consists of either me watching him play a video game, or bonding over sporadic conversations about our vague plans for the future and the tediousness of grad school. However, hanging out with Charlie always has this lighthearted quality to it that has probably kept me from completely breaking from the stress of everything. It’s kept me grounded. I think if Charlie had also moved away after graduation, I would’ve become a complete hermit. I had 4 years to forge these friendships; by comparison, the 2 years that it takes to complete my master’s program doesn’t feel like enough time to build a similarly strong friendship. And the cowardly part of me would rather spare myself an additional painful separation. Besides, I don’t know how to make friends. I don’t know how I became friends with these three, what made them continue to want to talk to me, to hang out with me. Whatever it is that they see in me, it seems that not many other people do.

Ohai thar, low self-esteem.

Aside from all that, I’ve come to appreciate a wider variety of games, as well as experience more aspects of gaming culture, as a result hanging out with Charlie. I’ve watched Charlie play a fair number of games over the years, and while some (or most?) were pretty weird and wtf, they were all interesting in some way or another. Some of the most memorable moments of the four of us together are from us hanging out at Charlie and Samee’s apartment, playing co-op games like LittleBigPlanet and Rayman Origins, or watching Charlie play one of his games that was a little weirder than usual (Catherine). I guess Sonic Shuffle was also fun too, on some very very minute level.

Charlie is so tall.

As for the gaming culture, last year Charlie invited me to go with him and his other friends to SGC, which is a gaming convention held annually in Dallas. The only other convention I’d ever been to was A-kon in 2012. By comparison, SGC is smaller, less hectic, and more laid back, all of which made me enjoy SGC more than I enjoyed A-kon. Going to the panels of some well-known gamers on YouTube felt more intimate, since the rooms weren’t packed to the brim with people. It was interesting to see the various games people were working on in the Indie Heaven room, and I was able to sample a variety of games since they had an entire room with consoles for people to play. Not to mention all of the old-school arcade booths.

Before college, I’d only played pokemon, a few zelda games, and some Crash Bandicoot. I didn’t even know what Steam was until spring semester of freshman year, when Samee, Charlie, and Cameron started going to the Arts and Technology Building to play games together on the computers. I’d never played any computer games before then either, unless you count a few random levels of Chip’s Challenge and Ecco the Dolphin. So I have to thank Charlie and Samee for adding more substance and variety to my life through the games that they have recommended and/or given to me. Gaming has become an integral part of my life, and I don’t think it would have been as rich or fulfilling without the two of them.

Saaaaapppyyyyyyy.

The Ones Who Matter (Part 3)

Well, so much for “tomorrow” from my last post. And it’s pretty much a given that the next 2 people I’ll be talking about will each have their own entry. You can’t just shove three friendships of 4+ years into one post. Or at least, I can’t. Because I’m always tl;dr, you know.

I think we got the whole week off for "snow days" because Texans don't know how to handle snow.
That doesn’t even look like it could be in Texas, does it? (Unless it was the panhandle.)

Anyway, Samee was the next person I met, and another of David’s roommates. Now that I think about it, the start to us hanging out was also rather weird. Of course, I had first met him during those moving-in days before classes started, but he was rather studious, and didn’t hang out often with everyone during freshman year. I didn’t actually start getting to know him until a month or two into the fall semester.

I think how it started was that I had left my keys in my chair during one general chemistry lecture and didn’t realize it. And I didn’t realize I had lost my keys until after they had closed. Of course, I had roommates, so they could’ve let me into the apartment, but we all locked our bedroom doors when we left the apartment, so there was no getting into my room; somehow I felt more comfortable asking Samee if I could crash in his room rather than just sleeping on the couch in my own apartment.

I was never particularly close to my roommates. I mainly attribute it to a difference in interests. They were great roommates, and I’m glad that they were the people I got matched with — I just really liked video games and anime, and they didn’t really do any of that. Plus, I am innately intimidated by girls. I think someone once told me it was probably because there are so many more social rules with females compared to males. I’ll believe it.

So, that day that I lost my keys and that night I crashed in Samee’s room, I remember falling asleep while actively having a conversation with Samee. I mention this because usually talking with someone wakes me up, and it is the only time I can really remember ever having been the person to fall asleep during a late night conversation. I think after that, I began to sit in on the gen chem section that Samee was in, since his professor was so much better than mine. I *did* try to take good notes, but there were also a lot of derp comics of prinnies and the like.

It was actually from Samee that I learned the words “herp” and “derp”. He’s also one of those types of people who is intelligent, but generally acts goofy because it’s fun for him and he likes to troll people. (I could actually probably say that of all my friends, but him especially.) As a result of hanging out with him so much during undergrad, a little bit of those qualities have also rubbed off on me. Don’t get me wrong, I do still probably care too much about what others think of me, but I’m much more comfortable than I was before about just acting silly in public.

Samee also helped me become more open-minded in general. He introduced me to Linux, and for a little while, I tried it. I also liked it, but eventually I got too annoyed by the formatting differences when opening a Word document in Open Office. He also introduced me to a wide variety of games. I’m not sure when it happened, but at some point during my relationship with David, I became a Nintendo fangirl. I find it weird because I had at least an equal amount of experience with a playstation as I did to Nintendo products prior to college. Maybe it had something to do with me only having ever owned Nintendo consoles.

I actually stole this from his Facebook profile pictures.
Samee has this reputation of being dang stylish at his med school. Couldn’t you see this being on an ad for prescription glasses?

In any case, due to him and my ADHD impulsiveness, in the spring semester of freshman year, I bought a PSP slim off of eBay, and it was one of the best and worst decisions ever. “Best” because I have played so many great games since getting it, and I still love it and have a queue of games that still need to be finished. “Worst” because oh my Lord of the Rings, did it totally distract me from focusing on classes.

I guess both Samee and Cameron also got me more into anime. Having only really watched Naruto up until that point, they were able to give me plenty of recommendations, which also distracted me from classes. Once I start an anime or manga, I usually marathon the series until I either finish it or catch up to the most recently released chapter/episode. (This also goes for TV shows.) I enjoyed most of the games and anime that they both recommended, and quite a few of them gave good food-for-thought. For example, Persona 3 Portable got me through a really tough time last fall, and I should probably dedicate a post to it at some point.

As much as Samee liked to help me dun, he also cared about my academics. We were both premed, and he was the one who told me about Molding Doctors. I can’t remember how much I’ve spoken about MD on here, but I was a member since sophomore year, treasurer during senior year, and vice president during my first year of grad school (last year). Needless to say, it was a large part of my undergraduate life, and since Samee was also a member and fellow officer during those years, a great deal of my memories of him are during MD events. (And then I will not go into any detail of any of those memorable events at all. Deal with it.)

I don’t think I said anything about how he actually cared for my academics in that paragraph. I can’t really remember much of it either, aside from him suggesting things to try that might help me study better. And of course, I’m still trying to figure that crap out. He actually suggested OneNote to me a few days ago for srs note-taking, so we’ll see how that goes.

However, I will say that he was pretty receptive during that time that I was having an identity crisis about whether or not I have ADHD. He was skeptical at first, but that rather quickly became general inquisitiveness. As motivated as I already was to learn more about ADHD and tips geared towards those with ADHD, his interest in learning about it motivated me even more. And it’s always, always, always encouraging when the people closest to you don’t judge you or dismiss you when you think you might have a disorder that many believe is fake or made up. It allows you to focus on the changes you want to make to work with yourself, rather than distracting you by tearing at your self-esteem. At least, that’s the way it is/was with me.

I guess the bottom line is that he has pretty much always given me his support in his own uniquely troll-ish way and continues to do so. I feel the quality of this post is lacking — it feels more aimless than usual, but I know that all of the posts in this series won’t do sufficient justice to the people I talk about. You guys have given me more and mean more to me than I will ever be able to adequately express in words. Just remember that as you read through this series.

In conclusion — as if this were some kind of analysis paper (an analysis of my life?) — this is the worst transition ever and this paragraph is completely irrelevant to the rest of this post. I took a break on HRPG for the past month or two because ~summer~, but fall classes started today for me, so look forward to seeing more regular posts from me again. Hopefully.

Baby steps.