THE (unbelievably) AMUSING LIFE OF JESS

First, I must remark on the apparent stupidity of Walmart (unless anyone can give me a good explanation on this one). So I found a really nice DVD shelf for $27 (Here if you want one!) and it said it was available at the local Walmart. So I headed over there today, only to find it for $40! So I asked one of the employees about it, saying that it was cheaper on their website, and she explained to me that if I want the cheaper price, I should order it online and have it shipped to store for free....err, wait, what? Doesn't this seem like a lot more work for Walmart than just letting me pick up the shelf RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME for the cheaper price? But no no, that's not how it works, so I ordered it online like she said and in a week or so, my $27 shelf will be delivered to the Walmart where I can go pick it up.

In other news, I am really liking my job. I'm working on teaching the toddlers some basic sign language (so far we're working on "done" and "more"). They're all under 2 years old, but I used to babysit for a toddler whose parents taught her sign language and I really liked it. It has been ridiculously cold here lately and all the other schools around here closed except for mine. -_- It was around -30 to -40F with windchill. Yes, snot really does freeze.

So I'm in Illinois now, just getting settled in and looking for a job. I had 2 interviews yesterday and I think I will probably get an offer for at least one of them. It's at an early learning center, like 2-3 miles away from where I'm living and has benefits, but doesn't pay very well. I'll probably take it for now though, until I can find something a little better. I might just stay there until the new school year begins and I have my license all sorted out and can apply for public school openings (the license is an incredibly slow paperwork process, so I don't even have my Oregon one yet).

Nothing too crazy happened on the drive over. The most noticeable things were a terrifying night drive across the Rocky Mountains as it poured down snow, a truck that caught on fire on the side of the road, and 8-ish cars that slid off the road in Montana (there were "gusty crosswinds"). We also took side trips to see Mt. Rushmore and explore Billings, MT. I wanted a Billings shirt but everywhere was closed because it was Sunday, darn.

Well I'm done with school, as of last Friday! I was very concerned that I might not pass mycology (fungus class), but it worked out in the end. I graduated with a 3.58, which is good enough for me, hehe. Now I'm moving to Illinois on the 27th (well, that's when I leave Portland, anyway) and I'm waiting to get my teacher's certificate and stuff. The last few days have been terribly boring with all the snow and ice, since it's hard to go anywhere and I'm stuck in my mom's little apartment. Also my sister is leaving tonight to visit some friends in uhhh, Tennessee, so I won't have her to hang out with either. Oh well! I have plenty to get ready anyway before I move. I bought a wool coat today for $80, it's lovely and warm. *_*

So after far too much candy, pizza, and video games, my sister decided she should head back to the dorms at around 12:30am. We headed for the door to my apartment and I remarked, "I hope it's not too crazy out there." As soon as we opened the door, we were greeted by loud maniacal laughter in the distance and the sound of police sirens in several directions. My sister then said, "Oh my god! It's like we're in Gotham City!"

Edit: Now there is a shirtless guy seriously spazzing out across the street, screaming at the top of his lungs and thrashing while 2 other guys restrain him. Lovely!

So, my old ps2 took a turn for the worse and started giving me disc read errors for all my ps1 games. I took it apart like usual (this is not an unusual occurrence), cleaned the laser, fiddled with the height a bit, but nothing was working. It would occasionally read a ps1 game, but never consistently. So anyway, I bought a new (silver *_*) ps2 and put my old one for sale on craigslist. The next day, I got a very suspicious sounding e-mail from someone who wanted me to ship it out of the country and pay me through paypal. "Probably a scam!" I thought to myself, but decided to wait and see, so after confirming that I would only ship to a confirmed and verified paypal address, they sent me the money and I got an e-mail from paypal. "Hmmmm," I thought to myself. "Although official looking, this does not look like Paypal's normal e-mails." So I checked my paypal account and lo and behold, no new money! So I merrily reported the e-mails to Paypal's scam link and forgot about the whole affair. However, today, I received another e-mail from "Paypal" via the scammers that made me laugh and I had to share.

Dear Valued Customer,
The Money as been deducted from the buyer's paypal account and will not be credited into your account until you send us the USPS Shipment Tracking Number ,The transaction cannot be cancel you must shipped the item out by tomorrow morning or LEGAL ACTION shall be taken against you.


We request for the Tracking Number to prove postage of the item in less than few hours and we will fund the money into your account or face the consequences of LEGAL ACTION and your paypal account will be canceled and you will get Busted By the FBI
This is done in other to protect both the seller and buyer. email the tracking number to us here ( shippingdetails@clerk.com )

------------------------------ ------------------------------ ------------------------------ -------------------------

Thank you for using PayPal!
The PayPal Team
------------------------------ ------------------------------ ------------------------------ -------------------------
PayPal page.
PayPal Email ID: PP304




And yes, it really came with that picture to try and scare me into shipping my poor half-working ps2 to Nigeria.

How have I never heard of this site before? Here, you can search for your name (or the names of anyone you know) and see if they have any unclaimed money the state owes them. It's through the treasury department and each state has their own site. You can find them here: http://www.unclaimed.org/

I've found money for a few people so far (my aunt and uncle, Nick's dad, Zoe's parents), so goodluck to you!

So last year at this time, all these huge spiders started appearing in my old apartment. At first, we thought they were hobo spiders or something terrifying, but after further inspection under a microscope, we found they were giant house spiders, which are no big deal, but still pretty big and creepy. Well, I guess Corvallis is just full of these giant guys, because I found a huge spider in my shower this morning. The logical part of me says it's probably another giant house spider, but I'm still being cautious and I removed it outside, where it can run around and find some other house to inhabit. :P
Look how big it is!

So lately I feel like I'm constantly waiting for people to respond to me. As a result, I am largely stuck in this tiny apartment, bored to death and annoyed that I have to keep waiting. Things I am waiting on:

-some guy from craigslist to pick a thing up from me, which he has failed to do so far (he was supposed to come over yesterday and I waited all day for him, so now I'm waiting for another response from him)
-some guy from craigslist to pick something up from my dad's house, which he has failed to do so far (he was supposed to come over yesterday, same deal as first guy, waiting on his response)
-a call from the lady whose daughter I tutor, to find out when she wants to start meeting
-an e-mail from my thesis mentor, to find out when he wants to start meeting
-an e-mail from a genetics counselor, to see when I can come shadow her
-an e-mail from the payroll office at OSU, to see why they aren't deducting any federal taxes from my paychecks (ok, this one's understandable, it's the weekend and I e-mailed them on Friday)

Honestly, how long does it take to respond to a simple e-mail or phone call? And why can't people come over when they say they will? I am so sick of sitting in here, listening to a baby cry next door.

So, Nick's gone back to Michigan, I'm back in Corvallis, nothing particularly interesting is happening. I cleaned out my rooms back in Portland and I'm in the process of selling all the nicer stuff on ebay and craigslist. Everything else got dropped off at Goodwill. I'm currently selling 17 things on ebay and 3 on CL and the most bizarre things are selling the best...like some weird animal tarot card things that I forgot I had and now I've lost the book to use them. Once December hits, I'm going to sell most everything I own here as well. So if you're in Corvallis and want any furniture or handy apartment things (everything from a complete bed to a TV to kitchen stuffs), you'll know who to turn to!

I'm currently seeing how long I can go without buying any food. Considering I just got back from being gone for like 3 weeks, I do not have a whole lot, so I'm being creative. Dinner tonight was garlic crackers dipped in strawberry cream cheese. I'll probably have some soup later.

So I'm currently in Chicago visiting Nick's parents and having a very good time out here. It's so pretty and warm and we've been busy seeing family and getting ready to go up to Michigan. I don't start school and work until the last week in September, so I still have lots of (somewhat boring) summer vacation left. Although I do have some appointments, jury duty, my grandma's bday party, work meetings, and helping Annie get ready for college (she's staying in my old dorm room, how weird is that!), so I'll manage to keep a little busy.

In other news, I'm greatly considering moving in with Nick's parents when I finish school in December. It'd be much easier to visit him, even though he'll be up in Michigan (plus it'd be you know, basically free to live here)...and it'd be way easier to find a job and everything here in Woodstock (where they filmed Groundhog Day!) than in the barren upper peninsula of Michigan. And you know, 8 months of winter each year doesn't seem that awesome. Also, hauling all my stuff across the country wasn't exactly appealing. I wasn't even sure if my poor little car could handle it. Now I just need my cat, my clothes, and my computer.

Anyway, that's what's happening over here. Just thought I would give you a little update.

So I (finally) finished with summer school a few days ago and I got all my grades... >_> Hey, I uh, passed them all, so that's good! Nevermind that one grade was a C-, it still counts and when am I ever going to need to know the intricate biochemistry pathways of the citric acid cycle and insulin receptors. Psh, biochemistry, you're useless to me! Everything else was good, though. One more term to go!

I'm done with work (and school) for a month, which is relaxing. Means I can't pay my credit card completely off this month, which is no huge deal. I'm getting a big raise and increased hours when I go back to work, so I should be fine after that. I'm acting as the Temporary Site Director (capital letters!) of the daycare while my boss is on maternity leave.

I'm heading to Chicago & Michigan on Thursday to return Nick to his family, then help him move back into school. I'm planning on moving to Michigan in early January, by the way. Anyway, I'm trying to think of some last minute Northwest things to do before we go back. At first, I was thinking I would take him to Mt. St. Helens, but the weather is rather crappy, so that wouldn't be too fun. Multnomah Falls would probably be pretty crummy in the rain as well. Oh well, maybe we'll just sit at home and play scrabble and watch movies. XD

Here is a picture of my dumb dumb cat looking silly.

Look what happened right outside my apartment a few days ago. :O



Very exciting indeed. Five minutes after it happened, a bunch of guys mysteriously produced chainsaws and went about sawing it apart trying to clear the road. Eventually some city people had to come with big machinery and move the big chunks of it.

I was trying to decide which excuse to go with, as to why I haven't posted in forever. I couldn't decide between lazy and busy, but it's really both. I'm super busy all day, so when I get home, I just laze about. However, I am currently stuck at work for another 8 minutes, so I have decided to do something with my time!

Anyway, tomorrow is my last day of student teaching. I feel kind of weird about it. On one hand, I can't WAIT to be done. These kids drive me crazy and I hate spending 8-9 hours/day at school. It takes up sooo much time and then I still have to try and make money to pay rent and such, which really isn't going so well, because I have no money. However, student aid comes through on July 1, which I am greatly looking forward to. Well, like I was saying, I can't wait to be done, but I also really do kind of like those kids. I don't know. At this point, happiness of being done is kind of outweighing missing the kids. Oh well, it was an experience.

I'm actually not planning to go into teaching anymore. I really like working with kids and helping them learn, but teaching is a little too intense for me and it bothers me that so many kids fall behind and can't catch up because the teacher doesn't have the time to help them learn everything one-on-one. I'd really like to be a tutor because of that, and I think I'd be pretty good at it. That's my plan right now, anyway. I still have 6 more months left of school though!

Nick's living with me now, which is perfect. Everyone kept saying things like, "Oh, this will be a big test for you," blahblahblah, like they thought we'd hate each other once we were living together or something, but it seems to be going fine. Very fine, actually!

I am coming into Portland tomorrow, because I have a week off from school and work, which should be very relaxing. ^_^ I'm looking forward to seeing people and hanging out with my family and friends.

Ok, well, work is now over, so I must be off! I hope you enjoyed this little update.

Also, Nick just sent me this. And I think I should share because it's awesome. Yay katamari! <3

So last night, I slept over at my new apartment for the first time. It's currently in a state of messiness, with boxes and stuff all over the place. I really really need to unpack, but there's just no time! (I'm currently at work right now, which is the only reason I'm not unpacking at the moment) I'll upload some pictures once I've got the place a little more organized. I should also be getting my new computer on Tuesday, woohoo!

Also, I am so jealous of everyone ALREADY OUT OF SCHOOL. I still have over a month left of this term, darn you!

So it's been a pretty long time since I last posted, so I thought I'd do a little catch-up! Currently, I am:

-student teaching full-time
-working at the daycare part-time
-taking a class
-working on my thesis
-moving apartments
-over $10k in debt

Actually though, things are going pretty well! XD Nick's coming to live here during the summer and will be arriving in less than a month, so that'll be great, and I'm excited about my new apartment. Not so excited about the debt, especially since I'm currently applying for MORE loans. School is lame, I can't wait to be done in 8 months.

Ok, so I start my student teaching tomorrow.

...

TOMORROW!

The teacher I'm going to be working with is really nice and I've already spent a day meeting all the students and they seemed to like me, so I'm really excited/nervous that I'm actually going to start my 6 months of student teaching tomorrow. And on Tuesday, there will be a substitute, which should be really interesting. I guess it's time to see if I can handle a classroom of fourth graders or not!

Strange things Avery does:
-Brings me all the twist ties she can find and drops them in front of me, looking so proud of herself. Sometimes she pounces them a few more times for good measure.
-Attacks my face in the middle of the night and latches onto my hair
-Refuses to drink out of a water dish. She prefers the toilet.
-Is obsessed with using Rika's litterbox instead of her own.
-Follows Rika around everywhere and always looks hurt when Rika turns around and hisses/growls at her.
-Eats pieces of fuzz off the floor.
-Tears around the house almost constantly, ricocheting off the walls.

She's so special. >_>

So I'm currently at the Cincinnati airport, tired, hungry, and bored. I fail at sleeping on planes and it's too early for any food places to be open and no one is online (well, I wonder why :P). Oh well, it's all worth it since I'll be in Chicago in a few hours.

I passed an important teacher licensure exam! I did really well on the math/science portion and well enough on the reading/history section, haha. Oh, and my kitty is doing good, although she tried to attack my dog today. Poor dog didn't realize I was holding a cat and jumped up to see what it was, so Avery hissed and swiped at her, but didn't hit her or anything, so it was all good.

Ok, well there's nowhere to plug the laptop in and it's out of battery, so I guess I'd better go. *grumbles more*

That's right, I have kittens. See, I saw this guy blatantly dropping these 3 kittens off on the side of the road (2 blocks away from the humane society, I might add), so I had to rescue them. I knew I could only keep one, so I took one to the humane society, gave one to Alex, and kept one for myself. However, because Alex is going away for winter break, I'm taking care of both of ours for a couple weeks. These are the sweetest kittens ever, btw. Also the cutest. See for yourselves.

Alex's cat, O-Ren.

My cat, Avery.

Avery is actually way cuter than that picture shows. Truth be told, that isn't even Avery, it's the cat I gave to the humane society, but the two were basically identical. Avery's the one chowing down.

Oh, and I just got back from San Francisco. Drew, Alex, Chris, and I took a roadtrip down there for 4 days which was super fun. However, I drove for 7 hours today and I am very tired. Yay for being home finally. ^_^

I just got hit by a car on my bike and did I ask for their info? No, I got freaked out, told her I was fine, and rode home, only to find that MY FRONT WHEEL IS BENT AND MY BIKELIGHT IS BROKEN, AGH!