Week of entries!

Here is a week's worth of writing!



Monday

The drive here was nice, started work around noon. Got almost no surveys done, but I am doing them the way I was told to. Bleh! I just tell myself, another day, another 64 dollars! I bought two microwave dinners, a bag of carrots, and some salad dressing. I was going to save one of the dinners for tomorrow, but I was still hungry after eating the first dinner and half the bag of carrots... so I just made up the other. I'm thinking tomorrow night to maybe get pizza or something. I can eat the leftovers cold for breakfast if I am feeling very cheap. It ends up costing almost the same to go get pizza as it does to buy two microwave dinners! I might as well get something somewhat nice. I have to keep reminding myself that spending money on food here isn't really hurting my budget. It just adds to it less.

I'm getting a lot of homework done though. I've finished half of my government homework and watched a movie in Swedish.



Tuesday

Well, I got up at 6 to get to the lake by 7. I actually got here at 7.15 since I stopped to buy donuts. I figure since they are paying me for the food I should get some nice things. I don't have to stick to such a strict budget like I do when I'm home. Plus it's hard since I only have a microwave. I'm limited to things that require microwaved water or can be microwaved themselves. I think maybe if I don't do pizza tonight (we'll see how hungry I feel after I stop work at 6 or 7) I might drive to Quincy and visit the grocery store there. It's bigger and cheaper, but it is a 40 minute drive there and a 40 minute drive back. Normally I'd not even consider it since I'd use up any savings in gas, but since they are paying my milage I'd actually make some money off of the trip. I just don't know if I feel like spending the time to go down there! Maybe tomorrow or Thursday if I'm getting very bored.

So far I'm bored, but being very productive! I've finished all my government homework (read 6 chapters and did the study guide). I've also finished my poverty class homework. That involved reading 2 chapters, 2 articles, and doing the study guide. I've started typing up swedish s verbs too. I hope to finish the s verbs tonight and type up the g verbs. Getting the s verbs done will be a big accomplishment since s takes up the most room in the dictionary!

I went to the library today and registerd for my classes for next semester. I'm going to take 17 units. 5 normal classes and 2 PE classes. I'm going to be taking next semester 2 economics classes, a child development class, a gender class, and a political theory class. I'm also going to take aerobics to stay in shape and ballroom dancing cause it's silly that David can dance better than I can! I had some problems registering for classes since one of the library computers has cookies disabled and won't let me turn them on. I asked the librarian about it and she said try the other computer, and if it didn't work she could call a few places for me and ask if they had cookies. The other computer did work so I didn't have to explain what a cookie was to her. How would you like to be running an internet cafe and have someone call and say "Do you have cookies?" *giggle* It made me smile. :)

Well, only another 2 and a half hours to go! If all the boats go away sooner then I can leave and just say I was here until 7, otherwise I'm stuck until sundown. I actually kinda hope that they don't leave because if they do leave then I have to get up and go interview them. I'm feeling lazy and I like staying inside my nice warm car. Maybe I'll just leave at 6 no matter what. I have 3 trailors left. I worked from 7-1:30 today and started working again at 3. So I've worked 6.5 hours this morning and 1.5 hours so far this afternoon. That alrady adds up to 8. Any more hours I put in are unpaid, but since I don't really have much better to do, I think I'll sit here. With the exception of finding food (that isn't cheerios!) I don't really have anything to do that I can't do sitting here in my car. I even have an extra laptop battery in my truck if this one dies. (I still have 43% left though).



Wednesday

Today started out pretty uneventful. Until I locked my keys in my car around noon. Some nice gentleman gave me a ride back to my hotel where I called a locksmith. I havn't had to pay the locksmith. He says to call my parents, get the AAA number and give it to him. I think AAA pays him better than people without AAA. Took about 2 hours out of my surveying time, but I did get a nice lunch and everything. Turns out the locksmith knew the name of the guy who rescued me and he's a church person. I'm going to call my mom this evening once I get reception on my cell phone, get her information, then call the guy back. He's being very nice to do this. Having AAA (American Automobile Association) means that they unlock your car free of charge. The one who has the card is required to be present, but he's just going to look the other way. This makes me happy of course! I'm not going to have to pay anything!

Last night was nice. I got pizza and picked up a 6 pack of bacardi silver or one of those flavored malt beverages that is nice and sweet. I drank 2 of them, and talked to my parents for an hour. My mom and I are going to go to a quilt show this weekend. She's going to come visit me on Saturday. I'm really looking forward to this.

I'm doing a crappy job surveying today. I've made answers up a few times rather than bother people who are in a hurry. I just write down that they declined to be interviewed rather than get out of my car, especially since I already think I interviewed them a few weekends ago. I'm spending today at one boat ramp, all day. And I think tomorrow I'll spend sitting at the other ramp. I'll get LOTS of homework done then since there isn't really anyone who uses that ramp. Although if I'm over there I"ll probably get bored and do a bit of surveying of the shore fishermen. That way I at least get some surveying done! Although I think right now part of my job is to actually stay here and say that no one comes by. It's part of the data that they need. I went and took some pictures of the boat ramps that aren't being used just to show my bosses why they aren't used. (they aren't in the water!!!).

This journal is SUPPOSED to be about my preparations for Sweden, and right now it's just a list of what I'm doing each day. So here's the bit about my Sweden preparation; I just watched Disney's Atlantis in Swedish! That's not much is it... but maybe this evening or this afternoon I'll work more on verbs. That'd probably be more productive. I wish David lived closer so I could just call him when I needed someone to talk to... Oh well... Live moves on.



Thursday+Friday

Yesterday was pretty uneventful. I did finish typing up the varulven story. :) I just retyped it from a pdf. I'm working right now on finding all the words in it that I didn't know. I understood the main plot, but a lot of the words in the story aren't even in my dictionary. I put the thing I typed into word and now using footnotes I'm working on putting definitions in. I'm probably going to need help. Even once I get home and use the better dictionary that's online, I still think a few of these old fashioned words I won't find.

I think actually typing up stories and texts, even if I don't know all the words, helps me. I get to learn sentence structure and spelling. The story of varulven was about 9 pages long, single spaced, when I put it into word. Once I finish all the footnotes with vocab, it'll probably be quite a bit longer. Maybe I can get Jonas or David or Peter to help me with the words I don't know. The list is so long though! I wouldn't want to give it to just one person at one time.

Last night I watched Pinnochio in Swedish. I learned a new word, but I don't know how to spell it. *laugh* But it means whale! The more I watch these movies the more I understand. I don't think I even realize how many words I learn from them. Some of what I learn from the movies is just how to properly use the words I already know. I know what a word means, but often never use it. I figure the reason I don't use it is that I havn't been exposed to it enough to be familiar. My goal from now until Christmas is to watch a movie a week in Swedish. If I can find that many movies that is! So far this week I've seen Pinnocio, Atlantis, Pochahontas, and Tiger's movie.

I still havn't gotten very much done on my verb lists, but they are very boring to do. Those get the most work done on them when I'm at school and bored.

David's birthday is coming up. I wonder if he got the birthday card I sent him yet.

Today I travel back to my apartment and internet. I'll upload all of these nice little tidbits and see what's going on in the world. I feel so isolated up here at the lake. I guess it is good isolation though. It's really given me a chance to relax and pee into pits. I've gotten a lot of homework done too. I still have a lot to do once I get home though. I have a makeup assignment for anthropology lab and an exam on tuesday I still need to study for.