Things I did right on the math exam:
-Made up a sensible study schedule with material broken up into manageable chunks.
-Worked through questions in a logical manner, writing down everything I knew and what I was trying to solve for.
-Looked through the exam for questions I could do easily and did those first.

Things I did wrong:
-Assumed because I had taken Calculus 12 I would remember all of the material, rules for integration included.
-Failed to stick to the sensible study schedule.
-Did not attempt many practise problems, especially in areas I'd had problems with on the midterms.
-Did not go through the questions I was really solid on quickly enough to allow enough time to work through the problems I was less sure on.

I think that about sums it up. Augggh I hope I managed to pass, by some miracle.
Also I am totally wearing at least another layer plus fingerless gloves to write my chem tomorrow because I swear there is no heat in that gym.

The plan for the next week, roughly:

Tuesday:
-Finish reviewing math.
-Write math exam worth 60% of the mark. (oh boy, never had pass/ fail riding on a single exam before!!)
-Review most of my chemistry, including practice problems. Go over old exams.
-Zombie movie marathon from like 7 until 1. (Shaun of the Dead, 28 Days Later & Dawn of the Dead, I believe)

Wednesday:
-Review chem so much. SO much. Review session with professors from 10 until noon.
-Start reviewing biology- mostly cell bio.
-Write chemistry final, from 7 until 10 pm. Not ideal timing but whatevs.

(I wish I didn't have to keep doing chemistry; I don't like it at all. Mostly it just bores me once I get the concept. The quantum mechanics part was fun but I won't be able to do that unless I take more physics and I probably won't be able to take the physics I'd need for that because I didn't do Physics 12 because Physics 11 bored me to tears. So yeah. I will just have to suffer through.)

Then pretty much until Monday I have to just review the whole term's worth of biology.
And the worst part is, I guess, that I'm not even sure I want to keep doing bio. Some of it is really cool sometimes, but there's so much other stuff out there that I really hate myself for pigeonholing myself this early (actually, even back in high school) into the sciences. I guess because I got good grades I just assumed that what you're good at is always the same as what you enjoy doing, and never really questioned it. But now I find all these wonderful things like psychology and Greek and Roman Studies and a million other things that I could take that aren't what I am and was setting myself up for.
And people say to me "You could still do ____," or "you could still be _____" except I really can't. It would mean I've wasted an entire year of tuition, after all.
Agggh sometimes I wish I'd just not gone on to post-secondary and gotten a job at a clothing store somewhere.
I still could.

+++
Also I need to somehow drop my fish and the dress I borrowed from my cousin off at my aunt's house, figure out if I want to see the concert the night before my bio exam, and manage to get myself to the train station in Vancouver on the 15th. It's quite a feat. I have to take about five buses total plus the ferry.

AND THEN ALSO I might be having a friend come visit for next weekend and replan everything around him should he decide coming here's possible/ worth it. I pretty much have two different versions of the upcoming week going in my head because of this. I'm hoping to have one of the two options eliminated soon, though.

PLUS I need to finish my paperthickets response, amid all this, before I leave.

I really can't believe how happy I've been lately.
I mean, weekends are still iffy but that's just because of my stupid shyness and irrational fears of people making fun of me which I have to work on shaking.
High school is so great for instilling neuroses like that.

Last week I had the Hidden Cameras concert, and even though I didn't really know anyone there (well, the girl with the accordion I'd seen in the line for Tegan & Sara, and another girl I think I might have psych or bio or something with) I still eventually got up and danced and had myself an awesome time.
And tonight- Monday nights are always the best- I went to dinner with the Rotaract crew, ordered the weirdest thing on the menu, on purpose (Fried pickles. They were actually pretty good) and just... clicked with so many people, for so many reasons. I haven't laughed that hard with friends in forever. Has to be years, for sure.

Socially everything's starting to come together finally and I love it. Just gotta get my Friday nights in gear!

Also- and here I am gloating a little- I have been getting so many compliments on how nice I look from family, friends- everyone! I'm really getting it together in terms of style and that kind of thing, and my skin is clearing up finally, and I'm wearing lipstick and heels (or ballet flats if I'm feeling lazy) almost constantly. That does a lot for my confidence. Just knowing that I look pretty gives me the extra bit of courage I need to get out the door in the morning.
It was so weird being at home over Reading Break and seeing this new face in the old mirrors. It was a bigger shock than my family having redone the bathroom, or whatever else. I can actually look at myself in the mirror and not want to look away right away. It was almost like there had been an instantaneous change in that I was able to notice how much things had improved.
I think my life goal at this point is to come to my ten-year high school reunion and have like a friggen Disney entrance where people are blown away with how fabulous I look. Of course I will have a pair of Louboutins by then.
Or maybe I just won't come to my reunion and send a recent picture of myself in an Hermes scarf with my billionaire husband on our yacht.

Victoria has been really, really good to me. I don't like to think about where I'd be mentally even if I'd done my first year in Salmon Arm. I'm thinking there would have been serious depression there at the very least.
Anyway I am extremely grateful to be where I am right now.

I found music
And he found me
I gave him some tambourine
He game me a scream
I washed his dirty underwear
He made me toast
Music filled my mug with Vaseline
I gave him a choke

We could be happy
We could be free
If we don't make out
Or fall in love

I found music
And he found me
Bleeding from my fingers and knees
Plugged into a drum machine
Nailed to my head: a tambourine
And a guitar laced to my waist
A stone cold fever:
An internal melody

Guitars make me happy
Drum beats make us all free
Solid as a rock lover
Is the music in me

I found music and he found me:
A balding head banging pre-teen
So he seduced me in a dream:
I kissed his ugly gangly greens
He swallowed my pee

We lived to be happy
And prayed to be free
But it was soon found out
That my body is brief

I found music
And he found me
He kept me singing
To my dying day

Sing to be happy
Hum to be free
The eternal harmony
Music and me

-Music Is My Boyfriend- The Hidden Cameras
the song

_{they are just as amazing live as they are supposed to be. at the end it turned into a dance party type thing and joel gibb ran and danced through the audience. they handed out tambourines for this song.
oh yeah, and the backup dancers in giant balaclava things were pretty cool.}

I'm so glad biology and psychology together can still fascinate and mystify me (which is awesome, because I'm planning on a bio-psych degree)and can make me just sit here going whoa.

It's pretty damn humbling to know that all you are and all you experience is based on chemical signals, and that a misfiring or a malfuction or damage to nerves can change everything.

We learned about this pretty famous case which happened... I think it was around 1850 or so? Anyway, this soft-spoken, polite railway worker was involved in an accident which basically forced this huge metal spike through his skull and frontal lobe... and he was a completely different person afterwards.
Who we are- it's just neurons. Bits of brain.

So yeah neuroscience-type stuff is awesome and I love it.

Note to self:

If you actually got out and did stuff with people you wouldn't be lonely. Dumbass.

Also stop chasing after him because he is so not worth it but you keep forgetting that so this is just a friendly reminder to WAKE THE FUCK UP and start living your own life now.

And get a job.

Jesus.

This is what's up right now:

-My room is infested with fruit flies. I have killed anywhere from 10 to 20 today but there's still about that many hanging around my closet. Why my closet? I don't know! There's NOTHING in there they'd want. But they're just so gross and I have no idea how to get rid of them for good because EVERYONE in the building has the same problem. I don't want to go to sleep because they might crawl into my mouth.
EWWWW.
I don't know if I've mentioned this but I don't handle insects well. The Victoria Bug Zoo was majorly squick-inducing.

-I have a bio paper due Thursday night.

-I'm coat checking a concert for our newspaper Thursday night- should be quite fun as I've heard really good things about one of the bands involved- Les Monstres Terribles, they're called.

-I'm going to Vancouver for this weekend and then going home for our actual reading break. Should be a blast; I'll probably stop at SAS for a bit and talk to my teachers. I am a bit stressed about travel and things like that and making good first impressions with people. I need a haircut but I don't know if I'll have time what with everything, and I don't even know what I'd get done because I want the back to be really short but I also want to be pretty and girly and agh. Short hair is tricky. I think what I'll do is go to a really good salon and just trust the stylist's judgement and if it turns out looking too butch I'll just wear dresses and skirts and heels and pretty makeup and thin out my eyebrows more than usual until it grows out some more.

-I don't know if I'll be able to afford my textbooks for second term. I'm hoping my big three courses (bio, psych, and chem) will all take the same texts, which is pretty likely, and then Latin is still gonna be okay because the textbook was only like $20 or something and it's pretty well standard for everywhere in North America so even with the instructor change it should be fine. But if my bio, psych or chem books aren't transferable... I definitely need a job. I need one anyway but this is just more reason. Gonna drop off my resume at American Apparel when I go to get a haircut. I really want to work there anyways, regardless of pay. D: I've turned into such a hipster.

the play-by-play of the MOST BORING HALLOWEEN EVER:

4:30- got dressed up (as Death, yeahr)
5:00- headed out on Trick or Eat.
8:00- finished Trick or Eat with a purseful of candy and a trunkful of non-perishable food items.
9:00- went to Cinecenta to go see Thirst, which is what Twilight (and Breaking Dawn, really) would have been if Edward was a priest, and Bella was really pretty but also completely batshit crazy and married to someone else, and Edward helped Bella kill her husband, and Edward killed himself & Bella at the end. so nothing like Twilight, but totally awesome.
12:00- came back, wandered around until I found Rob & Kevin, wandered around with them and failed to find anything to do.
1:00-ish- watched the Rocky Horror Picture Show again
3:00- went to bed.

also:
Me (as Death): Are you Dr. McNinja?!
Dr. McNinja: Indeed I am!
Death: You're my new best friend!!
I still don't know who it was. Ninja masks do that.

THINGS THAT ARE JUST FRUSTRATING THE HELL OUT OF ME RIGHT NOW:

-Supposedly the average on my bio midterm last year was 26% and the prof is/ was on academic probation for making his tests too hard. WOO. Wish I'd known that earlier, like when I was REGISTERING.

-I signed up to do coat check at a benefit concert put on by our school paper. I stumbled across a very small event listing on LiveVictoria.com that says it is a no minors thing.
1) They never mentioned that when they were asking for volunteers
2) NONE of the advertisments for it, posters and otherwise, say this
3) They still haven't gotten back to me as to what I'm supposed to do, although they did confirm that yes, it is a no minors event. I hate being eighteen.

-I bought tickets for the Greyhound to go home last night and discovered after I got back to my room that the one for the day I was supposed to be returning is from Vancouver to Sorrento, not Sorrento to Victoria. Because I got a discounted rate for purchasing it two weeks in advance, the ticket was non-refundable.
So I went down to the ticket depot, fully expecting to have to buy another ticket and just count the $48.30 I spent on the original one as a loss. They actually refunded me the money and I got the ticket I needed. I felt pretty relieved and then I came back here to check my email and my mother had emailed me saying that I should have got a ticket from Vancouver to Kamloops, not Vancouver to Sorrento, as she would have picked me up there.
Of course at this point it's too late to change anything as once again the tickets are non-refundable.

But on the plus side, it's a beautiful day, I'll get to visit friends at UBC and then go home in a couple weeks, and I just had a Victoria Cream. So that's pretty good.

I'm feeling really hopeful.

I think I'm finally done being homesick/ missing people from school now. The perpetual FOMO is just not there anymore- I think because my brain's finally coming around to the fact that even if I was back in the Shuswap I'd be missing out anyway.

Like I've mentioned, people are actually talking to me sometimes. I'm going to try to do my best not to push them away/ get paranoid when people are nice to me. I think I did pretty well today on that front.

I've actually managed to make a couple friends, so that's good. And I'm going to try to start getting out to more (and by more I mean some) parties and things, after midterms are done of course.

Mentally I'm still not in great shape, and I'm dealing with the typical hormonal waves-of-hopelessness thing, but overall things are good, and getting better.

Okay, so I saw Little Ashes this evening.
*shocker*

I can't say how faithful any of the actors were to their real-life counterparts as I was not really familiar with the life of Salvador Dali before now. (Still am not.)

So, the movie:
-Fantastic costumes, hair, sets, all that jazz. Visually impressive. The scene with Garcia Lorca and Dali in the ocean is especially gorgeous. (Ruined somewhat by the girl behind me giggling, of course, but still a treat to the eyes.)

-The acting was superb, and the story magnificent and beautiful. You can see Garcia Lorca and Dali in the beginning being utterly fascinated with each other. The relationship develops beautifully- they're really falling in love with each other- rather than just a liason out of nowhere. (*cough* BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN *cough*) I really couldn't count the moments when I was going 'awwww' in the beginning of the movie. You feel genuinely sorry for all of the characters when bad shit happens. There's a scene partway in, after Dali gets back from Paris for the first time, where, uh.... anyway, I'll let you find that out, but Magdalena really comes across as a bitch at first and you want to hate her but then you just feel sad for everyone in the room. It takes a really awesome director and excellent actors to make a scene with that one's potential for ridiculousness come across as totally gut-wrenching.
(Actually, now that I've done some research... yeah, it's still tragic, but now it seems that Magdalena was being manipulated. Anyway the point is that IT IS VERY SAD IN MANY WAYS.)

-I really don't see why they cast Robert Pattinson as Dali. He delivered an excellent performance, to be sure, but it just seemed... strange to have all of these Spanish actors speaking English in a movie set in Spain and R-Pattz putting on a Spanish accent. (It was a good Spanish accent as far as I could tell.) All of the dialogue was in English except for Garcia Lorca's poetry, which was spoken in Spanish and then overdubbed in English. Overall, some interesting choices were made and whether or not they were more effective than their more-obvious alternatives (get someone Spanish to play Dali, have the movie be in Spanish) remains to be seen.

But I don't know shit about this stuff. Anyway, just see the movie with someone you love. It's beautiful.

Man, if I had known earlier that all it took was a pair of back-seamed pantyhose and heels to get me some decent body image, I would've bought them MONTHS ago.
And this weekend I am going to the gym so I can look even more fabulous in them.
And that is all.

(Now to find a nice pencil skirt...)

The biology thing has been resolved, finally. Not sure what's going on for next term.
^{and the WORST BIT is that I'm not even sure I want to DO a bio thing because there's all this other stuff out there and the bio we're doing right now is boring as FUCK but whatevs}
Still lonely and sad, but less so. Need to start watching TV in the upper lounge a bit more and hiding in my room less. Connecting with people is hard.
Psych midterm coming up Friday. It's all multiple choice. Hopefully there won't be too many questions on who did what study when. Am really enjoying the course and hope I do well on the midterm.
Fall is beautiful here. OAK LEAVES! ACORNS! We never had those at home! And it's not obscenely cold, and the bunnies are adorable... this is so my city. I feel so grateful every day to be able to live here and go to school here.

Things that suck (edit):

1) Being totally alone.
I don't go to parties (because I'm not/ never will be invited and don't want to make a nuisance of myself), I can't fit in/ make friends because all the cliques have pretty much been set up now, and I just sit in my room like a hopeless loser and go to movies by myself. I am so very, very tired of this.

2) This whole mess with the bio lab which ISN'T EVEN MY FUCKING FAULT but whatevs.
Last week my bio lab instructor sent me an email saying that I have to switch out of my bio lab and into another one because there is a "conflict of interest"- apparently we are in the same Latin class, although I hadn't even noticed until then, and this is academic policy. "Sorry for the inconvenience," she says at the end of the email.
Damn right it's fucking inconvenient. It's past time for me to switch courses without speaking to the senior lab instructor directly and begging permission, and I didn't get an answer from the senior lab instructor as to when I can speak to her until this afternoon.
Also now I am not currently registered in a bio lab for next term because I had to pick a different Latin lecture section because your lecture & tutorial are supposed to be the same and blargh.

3) Having to deal with Auntie Cathy on Sunday.
I'm sure I've mentioned the story when I brought a bunch of clothes that were too small for me out to my aunt & uncle's house a couple years ago and my cousin who is... three? four? years younger than me was trying on a pair of my favourite pants that had become too small on me and they didn't fit, and then Auntie Cathy tried them on and they were actually kind of big on her, and she says to my younger cousin "See, that's because my waist is so much smaller than yours."
(My younger cousin is in excellent shape, btw.)
Could be I'm reading too much into it, but I'm pretty sure she essentially called my younger cousin fat, and then me even fatter.
Oh yeah, and then there was the time when Mum sent her one of those Body Shop scrubbers for Christmas and then she either sent it back or just never used it (I don't remember which) because it didn't match her bathroom.
She is one of the last people I want to spend Thanksgiving with, is my point.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm missing out because I don't go to/ am not invited to parties involving large amounts of alcohol, and then I have to brush my teeth awkwardly in the bathroom while Sally is alternately throwing up and sobbing and Laura's taking care of her, and I realize that maybe being a total fucking loser is sometimes a good thing.

Just sometimes.

(Oh man, she's still crying so hard... fffuuuu I hate feeling like I can't do anything to help.)

I've been in Victoria almost a month now, and I love it. It really truly feels like home here, and it's just... everything Salmon Arm and high school wasn't for me.
People have been, like, talking to me! Actually starting conversations! This guy I don't even remember having met said 'Hi Rose' to me the other day when I was fishing for my keys in my bag outside the caf the other day. I could have a social life! I'm actually sort of making friends, and although it's happening slower than for most people here, it is happening. To people here I am worth something. My self-esteem is still not great but improving. I can leave my room and talk to people a bit without having my full face of makeup done. That is such a huge step, you have no idea.
There's possibilities here. I always have something to do, and I don't really resort to just snacking when I'm bored. I'm eating a million times better than I did at home, and I may actually lose weight here... still have to buy the gym pass, though!
My classes are intellectually stimulating. I'm actually learning things! And I'm applying my knowledge I gained in high school bio and chem here. I'm still not entirely sure bio is really going to be my thing but psychology is super fascinating and applying biology to it in later years is going to be mindblowing. Latin is amazing, too. It's so cool to be in classes where all of the students really care about learning the material. I've had to study! I got through high school pretty much never studying for anything and never doing my homework and here I not only have to do it I actually am doing it!

Anyway, all of this sort of came together last night when I attended my very first Tegan and Sara show. Background here: I own three of their five albums and know all the songs on these by heart. They've helped me get through some weird and not fun shit and their albums (and Who Killed Amanda Palmer) are always my go-tos when I have an issue I have to deal with somehow. Hell, they basically helped me survive high school.
So, not gonna lie, when they came on stage and started playing Dark Come Soon, I fucking cried. It was just... such an intense moment. It's like, shit, man, these are REAL PEOPLE playing this song which is one of my favourites of theirs. The rest of the show was amazing, too- all my favourite old songs of theirs and a bunch of new ones from their album coming out next month. They're so funny, and so cool, and so... down to earth, I guess. They go off on the weirdest tangents between songs.
Anyway, so when that was over, I kind of went, Man, all that stuff that their songs helped me get through...it's over now. I can go off and start my life and be confident and happy and be totally cool with who I am.
And that's what I'm gonna do.
(And I'm definitely seeing them again when they're back in December.)

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Uh so I really enjoy this comic by John Campbell called pictures for sad children aaand this is the most recent one and it often sums up my feelings on many days? It is of course centered on a white background on my desktop but you don't want to see my lame-ass icons, you want the wallpaper image. And here it is.

Today was pretty good. Had French toast with strawberries for breakfast, watched dumb internet videos for most of the day, went to dinner at my aunt's house, got leftovers for lunch tomorrow (yay!) and managed to interact socially for a bit.

Which is a huge step, and I'm hoping tomorrow will be even better. I've got a meeting of Rotaract at 7 and the season premiere of House party at 8.

I'm still pretty lonely and bummed out but I'm thinking that's probably mostly hormonal, so I'm going to see if there's any changes I can make to my diet to reduce my stupid PMS-induced mood swings. If it was a little less dramatic I probably wouldn't be doing anything but for a couple days a month I fall into this pit of despair and self-loathing. Fucking EVERYTHING makes me cry or want to die or at least spend the rest of the day in bed. Sooo... yeah. Not sure if I should reduce fat intake (actually that's a given so at least I won't feel like a walrus this time next month) or what. Probably what I will do is try to mostly cut out sugar for the next while and see if that helps, since it causes problems for me anyway.

But the point is, today I kicked the Polish guy's (Chris? Is his name Chris? Everybody in the dorm is named Chris) ass at Mario Kart today. And that's a start.

The email I got from my mum (an excerpt):

I realize you don't want to read this but I wouldn't be doing my job if I just let this one ride.  I thought that your money was to be budgeted out over the year and still to have some leftovers.  This means that frivolities like your latest piercing come out of your pocket.  I didn't think that your last one was doing well enough to merit another one.

She's just mad I spent the money on it! I am so relieved, and amused at the same time. Seriously... wow. I am so glad she was so cool with it.
HAPPY ROSE IS HAPPY.

I can't believe how FAST we're learning stuff in classes- it's amazing! I've got an assload of Latin vocabulary to study, most of a whole chapter (learning about quantum and things) for chem, and a ton of bio to do. And I am VERY happy about this.

Soooo... I got a lovely upper helix piercing yesterday:



And I must say I'm kind of worried because my mother had said I couldn't get any more piercings, but what I did was I fired off an email to Mum telling her I'd got it, and now I'm just waiting for the inevitable shitstorm.
I'd better mail her some presents or something.