for a while, me, ira and lilian have been planning a shopping trip to niagara falls/buffalo.
this is a tale of our events.

Saturday

10AM - ira and lilian rents car from sketch markham asian place

11:30AM - they arrive at my house. ira drived, lilian scared. some story about some "crazy person" RE: lilian's blog

1:30ish - lilian drived to the U.S. border. ira's status is "student" and has an Indonesian passport so they made us get out of the car and wait at customs for a while. it felt like we just got caught for smuggling cocaine or something. man, what a hassle. vanessa called me but i couldn't speak because no cell phones were permitted and there were like border officers walking around everywhere


=D


ira, so vain


waiting in traffic. note, there's about 10 pictures of us doing this




me ripping off ira's montreal pic




U.S. border!

2:30 to 9PM - ira drove around the U.S. we shopped at the Niagara Falls outlet place and drove to some mall in Buffalo. the sales were pretty good, but the only drastic difference in price that i noticed would be at the Coach outlet. seriously, GOOD coach deals but i didn't get anything because they didn't have the wallet i was looking for




a very complicated intersection


"artistic"


ira drove into a cemetary....


... lil was freaked out


niagara falls!!!

11:30PM - i was driving back at 110 km and we were near the outskirts of oakville, and at this time, the red engine light came on. then we heard this loud buzzing sound, and lilian noticed all this smoke coming from the car. i was going to get off at an exit but i couldn't accelerate anymore, the car was going at maximum 80 and i had to pull over right away.

ira took the driving seat because the rental car's under her name. ira and lilian lifted the front hood, and all this smoke came out. it was freakin' scary as hell! cars were driving by right beside us so fast and it was really windy and dark outside. while we waited for the car to cool down, we sat inside, looking up numbers to call from the GPS.


on the side of the highway!!!

12:45AM to 3AM - when the smoke died down, ira tried to start the car but it wouldn't work. after a short while, the police came and called a tow truck for us. all three of us squished into the tow truck and the guy told us the furthest he could drop us off without additional fees would be at a canadian tire in oakville. so we got there, ira had to pay the bill of about $126 and i called my brother to pick us up there. he dropped us off at my place, and i drove to markham to drop off lilian and ira.

WHAT A FREAKIN DAY!

rental company didn't pay us back yet. this tale is to be continued.

yesterday was a good send off with all-you-can-eat sushi for dinner with a whole bunch of people. later on, dustin and gang hit up morty's but me and becky didn't end up going. i had a lot of packing/cleaning to do, and i ended up sleeping around 5AM.

exams - over!
the absolute delight didn't come until right now. just spent the last four hours packing and cleaning. all my shit is upstairs ready to go, and now my room is echoing as i type. it's brilliant.

everything in the kitchen area is clean (it's probably going to be a mess once winnie comes storming through), but i still feel satisfied nonetheless

cathy, you're good to go.
and so am i

happy last day of school

• Koziol is biased and an overall poor professor. I don't care if you think I am being harsh, it still doesn't make the statement any less true. I would gladly debate this topic to anyone who knows her and who's had her teach you. Otherwise, if you don't know her, you have no opinion and no right to say that I may be wrong

• Girls are either best friends, bitches, or backstabbers. Why can't girls have the same kind of "chum" camraderie as males have with each other? They care about popularity, vanity, impressing guys. What happened to the hos > bros statement that Brooke so adamantly supported? Guys will break your heart so why do us girls keep going back for more?

• It's all about looking cool. Why do people act different around me or treat me differently depending on the group of people around us? I'm tired of being people's "secret" friend in private, but being completely dissed in public. It's insulting how I'm such a good friend and listener one moment, but another, I can't possibly be seen with.

• I deserve better. Lately, my standards have been steeply declining as I struggle with my feelings of self worth. The environment around me is making me feel like I am a lesser version of myself. My inadequacies are evolving into a sense of desperation. I'm only freakin 20, but why do I feel so rushed for time?

Okay hold up, this started out as a bitch entry about Koziol.

So I finish next Tuesday on the 22nd, and my exam ends around 5PM so I'm going to head home the next morning.

Okay so I got my offer of employment from the place I worked last summer, and I'm supposed to tell the H/R person when I'm AVAILABLE TO START WORK. Those are my boss's exact words.

So I mail Eileen Lockhart and state, "I am ready for work as of April 24th, 2008" and not necessarily when I was going to return because how the heck am I supposed to know that. Isn't that for my boss to decide?

Then she writes back. "Hi Marilyn, thank you for your email with your start date." And then there's this form I have to fill out and it says April 24th, 2008.

So I'm thinking, okay this is just for paperwork - it doesn't mean I'm returning April 24th. But there's a huge possibility that I may be wrong, so I send another e-mail to my boss just to make sure.

He just calls me right now (p.s. I'm literally on 3 hours of sleep) and tells me that he expects me to return on April 24th and if that was alright. I mean, I already faxed Eileen a signed confirmation back. Me, being the stupid, overjoyed-because-I-have-a-job half-awake idiot, says, "No, no! That's fine, that's fine!" WHAT AM I INSANE?! I leave Waterloo on the 23rd, come home, eat dinner, sleep and then go to work the next day?! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH stupid. stupid. stupid.

When I wake up again in 5 hours, I'm going to beat myself up about it even more.

this is the mess i left studying for finance II.

i left that exam feeling pretty good. studying REALLY does pay off - who would have known!? we had 2.5 hours to finish an exam worth 124 marks. it definitely was a time crunch trying to get everything done. there was no time to think or take your time making sure calculations were right - you just had to constantly rush, forcing you to know your shit to be able to get through the whole exam.

i left two sub-questions worth 2 marks blank, but it's okay. it turns out everyone else left two full questions blank because they didn't get to the end, losing like 40 marks! everyone has a consensus that the exam was way too long (i agree!) and that she's going to bellcurve it - which just makes me uber giddy inside.

do you ever get creeped out when you find out people know who you are and you have no idea who they are...

but then again, i do that to other people and i don't find myself to be a creeper

hahaha

no news to report. just studying

no one tells me gossip anymore. I SO TOO CAN KEEP A SECRET

it's been going alright,
me and shannon studied at the library until 6AM yesterday and i woke up at 3 today haha. i got ready and headed back to the library and here i am again with kevin. i feel like i'm becoming less and less sociable with every passing day

good luck, folks

The thing about me is that when something belongs to me, I'll be very reluctant to share it with other people. If it's mine, it's mine. If you want one of yours, then I'll be more than glad to get you one of your own for you to enjoy. Just don't take or use mine.

Like food. When I buy lunch, I don't like it when people start digging into what I have. I bought this lunch for me to enjoy and if I felt obliged to share it, I would have bought a bigger lunch to begin with.

Or using things like my laptop, my hair straightener, my printer.

I don't like when people take or use my things at home without asking, like a water bottle or my shampoo. Or using my personal pots and pans. And I always feel like I'm supplying everything, like the toilet paper, the paper towels, tissue paper, the dish and hand soap, even the dish-washing gloves. I wouldn't mind if everyone was pitching in, but now I feel like everyone is using my stuff and the minute I stop supplying, no one will do a thing about it.

on reflection, the best thing i can say about ICE is that it's over.
nitin told me we did horribly, and no shit. i asked him what was wrong with our report, and he said "everything." i told him not to complain (because he had no right to - he didn't do shit).

i can say that my weekend home with my parents was the greatest.
i went home because my brother and his wife had to officialize their marriage license (don't ask me about it) at the church. here's some pictures that lillian sent me:





i love my family

DONE
YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!



and as an added bonus, i got to see someone today!

i'm here blasting my music full volume, cleaning up, packing to go home, and singing my heart out and it's absolufrickin beautiful outside - and NO MORE CLASSES, NO MORE SEEING MY STUPID GROUP'S FACES, NO MORE PRESENTATIONS, NO MORE ICE and i'm going back to the place i love. yeaahhhh baby!!!

we worked intensely everyday, all day - we stayed on campus yesterday all freaking day long but we FINISHED at 1AM. thank goodness we FINISHED!

afterwards, two of my group members came with me to Morty's to meet up with friends from our core (did I ever mention how much I miss Core A?!) and have some drinks. good end to a horrible couple of days.

ICE presentations to come.