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Events:

1917- World War 1: U.S. declares war on Germany

1930-Gandhi raises up a lump of mud and salt and declares, "With this, I am shaking the foundations of the British Empire." Thus he starts the Salt Satyagraha.

1930-Hostess Twinkies are invented.

** 2006- I threw a kick ass party at Longbranch :)

Births:

1483- Raphael, Italian painter and architect

1928- James D. Watson, American geneticist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine

Deaths:

1520- Raphael, Italian painter and architect
(He was born and died the same day)

This past weekend started off great. A few weeks ago, my friend Alex and I rented out Longbranch for this past Thursday to celebrate our birthdays. We invited all of our friends and it turned out to be one of the funnest nights I've had up here. Our friends decorated the bar with signs and brought cake. You may have noticed from my picture that there was a little bit of a cake fight( I don't think I cared at the time that I was covered in icing). It was a really fun night and great to have some of my friends from home come to visit.

Friday evening wasn't so great. A friend from home called me around 5:00 with news that our hometown(Goodlettsville, Gallatin, and Nashville area) was hit by tornadoes. He didn't have a lot of information at the time other than his church was half gone and that the roof of K-mart was blown into the street. He told me that phones weren't working well, and that he had trouble getting in touch with people. It took me about two hours to get through to a friend's parents,and even longer to get to talk to my mom and dad. It was really scary. It was good to hear that everyone was okay and that there wasn't too much damage to our house. Between my house, my grandmother's house, and my aunts house there were just some broken windows, lost shingles, and some uprooted and fallen trees. I am so thankful that the damage wasn't worse. There were some houses and businesses very close that were flatten or had severe damage. Some of my friends that headed home this weekend told me how awful it all looked. Please keep these people in your prayers.

Due to the storms on Friday Carnicus was postponed. I usually hate putting stuff like that off, but at the same time it was good because I had friend's in town that were going to have to wait around until it started. With the exception of storms, the rest of the weekend went pretty good. I'll see ya'll in class tomorrow! Hope you all had good weekends.

So, I don't know about everyone else but my last couple weeks have been really busy. I thought first semester was suppossed to be the hardest, but this semester has taken the cake and then some. I think a lot of it was the fact that I had a job and was dating someone. I guess things will start to slow down soon since I quit my job and things with my guy are well...fading out?? Also, campaigning ends today which will give me more free time, and we also perform Carnicus on Friday so that will be out of the way. I just keep telling myself that summer is a month away!!! I am trying my hardest to get a lot done today so that my weekend will be stress free! Tomorrow I am celebrating my birthday so my weekend is starting a day early :) and I have friends coming in town to stay with me!! There's my spill so back to homework now!

Well, I have to say… my Odeo recordings may have been interesting to listen to, but since they didn’t work here is my spring break: It was really fun; however, there was a lot of drama. I guess I should have expected it since there were 20 girls all together, all the time. I haven’t seen that much drama between girls since my sophomore year of high school! I probably shouldn’t even bring it up… I don’t know if other sorority pledge classes have had any disagreements, because I hope we are not the only one. Anyways, it was little stuff that has ALMOST been resolved since we have been back in Knoxville.

Oh yeah, some other not so great things about the trip… we got in trouble with the cops the first night(not our fault), and four of my guy friends were in a car accident on the way there. They were driving through the night and fell asleep and totaled their truck. They had to be taken to the hospital, but for the most part everything checked out okay.

Other than that, I think we all had a great time in Panama City. It was almost like a huge freshman mixer with everyone always packed together on the beach everyday, laying out, drinking, and just socializing. It was what you would expect from a college spring break trip. We always had something to do, even at night. We stayed at the Sandpiper Beacon which had its own Tiki bar, so you never had to leave the hotel. I also got to hang out with the ATO’s a lot over at the Summit.

On the way there and back I got to stay with one of my sisters at her house in Atlanta. It was quite the experience! Her family is from Puerto Rico and they kept me entertained 24/7. Her mom cooked some amazing food for us (something she called tostonayse, maybe?). Then she got on to us for wanting to put ketchup on her food. It was cool getting to meet her family. Overall, it was a good trip despite a few things!

I came to the decision today that I am getting too old, and I don't like it! Yesterday, my cousin had a baby... which means that I have a new second cousin! His name is Jordin and he is oh SO cute! My dad sent me pictures that were taken at the hospital of him holding Jordin, and also Nana holding Jordin. The first thing I did was call my dad and ask him how he felt being a great uncle now. What's really weird is that Nana is a great-grandmother, and I'm not the baby anymore.

Also, my oldest sisters birthday was today, and she is 26! I can't believe it. On top of that, my other sister called me today telling me about how she is looking at moving to Charleston next year to work, after she graduates from dental school in Memphis. All of this makes me feel like I am growing up too fast. I miss when I was younger and my sisters and I played slip-n-slide in the yard and fought over the front seat. Also, today one of my friends pointed out that in a couple months, summer will be here... that means freshman year will be over!!! Why did it have to go so fast???

I am stressing right now wondering if I really have time for a job. I am always scheduled to work and it conflicts with one thing or another every time. It is hard. Friday, I took my calendar in to work out a new schedule with my manager. With everything going on (Class, Spring Break, Carnicus, and Campaigning) I really don't see myself having too much free time until at least the middle of April. I have considered quitting, but I figure I can stick it out until the school year ends. My dad has told me that he is proud of me for being able to work for some of my spending money... I guess he is right.

And the good thing is... Spring Break is very soon, and I am leaving for Florida on Saturday morning. I get to get away from it all and just lay on the beach all day with my "sisters" along with half of UT's freshman class! Basically, I can't wait!

So this weekend was pretty much amazing. One of my friends, Jessica, goes to MTSU and is on spring break this week. She came up to stay with me on Thursday for the weekend and it was SOO much fun! Thursday night we went to SAE's boxing tournament which was pretty cool. It reminded me a lot of something that I went to a lot this summer in Nashville. One of my guy friends that fought did really well too. Since this weekend was one of the first weekends that I stayed in Knoxville in a while, we went out with friends every night, and had a blast. It was a pretty fun weekend. However, I was disappointed because I thought SAE was having Trotline on Saturday night, and they ended up cancelling the show. The weekend was even better because I got to hang out with a guy I have liked for a while, and we have some dates planned this week, yah! The most stressful part of the weekend had to be this morning though. Like I said, Jessica and I went out with friends last night and it had completely slipped my mind that today was our Founder's Day. Not only had I forgotten about it over the busy weekend, so had about ten other of my friends in my pledge class. This morning I got a phone call from Brittainy at 12:00 saying, "We have Founder's day! Get up and put on a dress because we only have 30 minutes to get ready and be there!" Yeah, it was crazy. I rolled out of bed, got ready in ten minutes, and rushed to meet about six other girls who obviously hadn't showered, and headed over to World's Fair Park. We couldn't stop laughing the whole way there while we listened to each other tell stories about the night before and how they had to rush this morning. We made it there on time, thank goodness! On the way back we all laughed about the situation and rocked out to Bon Jovi! Oh, how I love my sisters! Overall, the weekend was pretty awesome...and I can't wait until Friday!

Yesterday, since the weather was pretty much perfect, a few of us decided to skip a class(wrong, I know) and go golfing! It was Brittainy, three of my guy friends, and myself. Since they all have basically grown up golfing, I agreed to go and drive the cart just for fun. We were only going to have time to play nine holes because I had to be at work at 7:00. I work at abercrombie kids. I don't know if I am going to work there much longer because it's just not the same as back home. Plus, the fact that I am tired of greeting people by saying," Have you checked out our new jeans? We have great fits for boys and girls! blah blah blah. Anyways, we went golfing! By the seventh hole I decided I should give it a try. My friends taught me how to swing... and I think I did pretty good. Okay, maybe not good, but decent. I also decided I want to try to get a job as a cart girl this summer back home. Who knows? I may take up the sport.. uh maybe

Last weekend was A-M-A-Z-I-N-G! First off, it started on Thursday. Thursday night I went to ATO's valentine date party at Big Daddy's. My date left early and I spent the first two hours in the bathroom taking care of a "sick" friend. Surprisingly I sill had a great time. We danced a little, sang a little karaoke, all the good stuff. It was a good start to a long weekend.

Friday, I spent on a a friend's house boat at Center Hill Lake with myself, one other girl, and fifteen guys ... the odds were good. I think it was one of those trips that the car ride is the funnest part. It was me and four of my guy friends all crammed in a truck. It was a lot of fun!

The next day we left with the a lot of the same people and headed up to Gatlinburg. The ATO's had a brotherhood retreat and rented out a four story cabin that was awesome. Although the ride up there was extremely scary (driving up mountains on ice), we finally made it without much trouble. However, we had to park at the top of a hill and walk to the cabin because there was no way the truck would have made it down the hill without sliding. The walk down was, let's say ... interesting. My friend, Brittainy, was wearing cowboy boots without any traction. We had to hold her as was "skiing" down the hill. It was pretty much awesome. The cabin was so nice! It had two hut tubs, a few kegs(haha), a game room, an elevator, a movie room, and about 10 bedrooms. The next morning we woke up to the most beautiful snow that I have seen in a long time. We built a snow man and played around before we all packed up to leave ... it was pretty much the best weekend I have had at UT!

So, I just typed out my update and was almost finished and then lost all my work, cool. Now I kinda know how Joe felt in Motherboard. So here it goes again....

Random Occurrences on 2/8/06:

I guess you could say yesterday was a little more eventful than most. I didn't have class until 9:05 but I woke up early to get my new cell phone from my mailbox!! Why didn't I have a cell phone??? Well, I broke it last weekend when I went to visit MTSU. A piece of advice: Never get drunk and run around in a parking lot in the pouring rain with your phone in your coat pocket. You may drop it and not find it for another four hours, then attempt to fix it with a hairdryer. Plus the fact that you may get lost three hours out of Knoxville and have to stop at a shady gas station for directions. But that was all the past and now I was going to have a phone! So, I go downstairs and spend 15 minutes explaining to the lady at the front desk in the nicest way possible that I didn't care that it was a federal offense for her to get my mail from the back for me. I have not been able to open my mailbox once since I have moved in and it's not my fault. I just couldn't wait to turn on my phone and hear my ring again. Oh how great it is to have a phone. So I took it back upstairs and open it up. I couldn't figure out how to activate it and had to call verizon. They tell me I have to come into the store, crap! Well, it was time for class now, so that would have to wait.

I went outside. I waited on the T. The T never came. I walked. I was late. Then class, same old, same old. I was out by 1:30!! Yah, now time to get my phone activated! I went to West Town mall and got it working then went to print off my schedule in abercrombie. I was only scheduled to work Thursday night. As soon as I got back to the parking lot my friend called me to go to ATO's formal date party which is tonight, Thursday. I had to go back in and get someone to take my shift and look for a dress. After about an hour of no luck I just decided to wear one I already own. Now I am trying to get all my work finished so I can get ready, and that computer problem set me back. The rest of my day is going to be posted on the class blog "Joe Peacock" style so read on. It was well, interesting!

I just thought I would tell yall about my day.. yup. Well, I went to class, nothing exciting. Then I had lab and we had to swab random places eg. the bathroom sink, door handles, ect. to see what germs were there. That was pretty disgusting so I decided to go to Walgreens and buy some hand sanitizer, but more on Walgreens later.

I had to go by Massey and drop off a check...decided to tan (getting ready for spring break, ya know?) Then I came back to my room and my roommate accidentally drank bad milk from where our fridge came unplugged (that happened when we rearranged our room, if you read my last blog). That was nasty.

Back to the Walgreens trip... So, I am checking out and in front of me is this girl who is about our age buying pregnancy tests. Now, I know it's none of my business but I was watching her check out and she had two pregnancy tests up there. One was an off brand that I think may not be as accurate. Anyways, the lady rings up both the tests to see the price difference (which was $1) and tells the girl that the other brand would be easier to read. The girl takes her time and finally decides to buy the off brand because it is cheaper ($1 cheaper). Now in most cases, I would think, who wouldn't want the better deal... save some money!! However, this WAS a pregnancy test we are talking about... now here is the catch: The cashier rang up the test and ask the girl if that's all. The girl looks around and picks up a $1.50 candy bar. hmmmmm.

Moving on. I then ate with a friend and went to a campaign meeting for Freshman Outreach which I am excited about. Yall will hear more on that later. Afterwards, I went to the library. I never get anything finished in the library because I sit and watch people walk by and look for people to talk to. The Commons rock! I saw my friend at midnight because it was his birthday and then realized that birthdays just aren't as cool and exciting as they used to be. Neither is Christmas. I hate growing up.