!Que Increible!

Silly internet doesn't like to have diacritics on letters, so I couldn't put the proper accentos on my Spanish.

As I tried to fall asleep last night, I had an epiphany: "incredible" is something that is so amazing that it doesn't seem possible. It's not credible. It made me wonder how often we use "incredible" in the proper context. So, here are some of the first things I think about when I think "incredible."

The Incredibles: Okay, yeah, I'd say that Mr. Incredible is rather incredible. Mrs. Incredible/Elastigirl ... yeah, it's rather incredible to be able to stretch like that. JackJack is incredible, too. The jury's still out about Violet and Dash.

The Incredible Hulk: That movie was so incredibly boring that I can't get myself past the 20 minute long opening credits.

The Incredible Voyage: Some scifi/fantasy movie (from the 80's?) that involves going inside a person's body, I think. Magic School Bus is so much better.

And for good measure, here's a few quotes that involve "incredible":*

"I can believe anything, provided that it is quite incredible."
- Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

"To stop the flow of music would be like the stopping of time itself, incredible and inconceivable."
- Aaron Copland

"The thing that is incredible is life itself. Why should we be here in this sun-illuminated universe? Why should there be green earth under our feet?"
- Edwin Markham

"Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known."
- Carl Sagan

"The power of the mind is an incredible thing, one that can never be underestimated."
- Mia Hamm

"Even against the greatest of odds, there is something in the human spirit- a magic blend of skill, faith, and valor- that can lift men from certain defeat to incredible victory."
- Walter Lord

*Thanks to http://www.quotationspage.com for being an awesome engine for quotable quotes.

Have Yourself a Merry Unlit Christmas

I had my first bout of nerves today in ... I don't know how long. It's been quite a while. If you don't know what I'm nervous about, it's my test. If you don't know what test I'm talking about, well, too bad for you. You'll probably find out sooner or later. Maybe. Who knows?

My performance on this third Hearing Sciences test wasn't that great. I didn't get the grade I was hoping for, let's put it that way. I'm hoping to really ace this next test so that I can maybe get a B+ in that class.

Put the Christmas tree up yesterday. Or rather, I tried to put it up. The tree itself is up, but since it's an artificial, pre-lit tree, there were bad bulbs to sort out. Four sections, count them, four, were out. I have two of them resolved. The third I went all the way through and didn't find a bulb that lit the strand, which means there are probably 2+ bad bulbs in that section. The fourth section is the top of the tree, and I haven't bothered with that yet. All this translates to my not having decorated the tree yet, let alone having assembled my gingerbread house.

Of Making a Feast into a Vegan Meal

Both Thanksgivings have been eaten, and each went successfully. My mom made some "tofurkey" for my big brother's gf. Don't ask how that works, I don't really know, and I refused to touch the stuff. The vegan stuffing was good (you could tell it was vegan, but it was good), and my dad said the vegan pumpkin pie was not bad. I stuck to the classic stuff.

On the plus side, I got to talk with the gf about SLP stuff. It was fun and good, and she was excited, and liked the description I'd given of the voice class I'm taking. I even photocopied for her the article I presented on last Tuesday. Hopefully she'll come back ready to talk about more, because I love being able to talk with her about it. The rest of the family thinks I'm loony. My dad even cut short the discussion about ASL classes while we were still at the table.

Last Sunday and this one I've been helping my church with a ministry called Angel Tree, which delivers Christmas parents to kids that might not get any because their family is in prison. It's wonderful seeing all the packages coming in, and I'm good at sorting. The people who volunteer every year are great and make sorting all the more fun. I won't be able to help next weekend, but the weekend after that all the gifts are gonna be loaded so they can be delivered. Exciting stuff.

Starting to plan my courses for next semester. They're sill funky and quite dispersed throughout the day, and they'll interfere even more with my karate schedule than they have this semester. Le sigh. One of the classes, a lab, I can take only on Friday, and that doesn't make me happy. That means I'm making an extra trip down the hill for that one class, and I won't have any day free of classes, aside from the obvious weekend.

My dad has started a blog. Seriously. It's only, like, his fourth blog he's had (including one he tried to create that would just hold my mom's resume). Actually, he's started two blogs in the last week. One is supposed to be more for his Christmas newsletter stuff, the other one is for his ramblings and rantings, which I think will be profuse considering the fact that he now gets to sit in front of the TV all day with his computer. Only thing is, he's just as inept at his blogs as he is at his email.

Tis the Season to be Cleaning

Tomorrow is Wednesday. That means, since it's the Wednesday before the fourth Thursday of November, it's a day for cooking and cleaning. I hope I get to peel the potatoes. I like peeling potatoes, as long as I don't need to do them 365 days a year. But 3 days a year is a good trade off for mashed potatoes with butter, sour cream, garlic, and all sorts of other goodies.

We're having a friend from church come over on Thursday, and my older brother and his gf will be coming on ... Sunday. From what I know, we won't exactly be having a proper Thanksgiving-type meal on Sunday, especially given the fact that the gf is now vegan.

Speaking of family and holidays, my grandma is apparently going to be coming down for Christmastime. Keep us in your prayers: the last time she came down, she locked herself in the guest room for the day because she felt we weren't letting her help enough around the house. Oh, and the day when I was thinking of starting on my ceiling ... that's the day Grandma's supposed to arrive.

My two early classes tomorrow have been canceled, but I still have the option of going to school for ASL. I'm not planning on it; I'm tired. I might even not get up until 8:00 tomorrow morning.

We picked up the paint for my room on Sunday. I'm happy to have the paint, but it won't be painted for a while. See above note about Grandma being in town when I want to be working on my room. However, if I can manage it, I'm gonna sneak into my room some tomorrow and do some more cleaning in there. Who ever guessed that cleaning would be so therapeutic and purifying?

The Shin Bone's Connected to the Knee Bone

Blogging early tonight, because I want to go to bed and get some sleep. Someone asked me yesterday if I'd been up late at night studying a lot, because I looked like I hadn't really been getting any sleep. Such a confidence booster. Even so, I didn't feel overly tired. Such sensations are reserved for Tuesdays.

I tweaked a muscle a bit in my training. It's a muscle that runs along the outside of your leg, from your knee on down your shin. Said muscle is very involved in, say, pointing or flexing your foot. Trust me, if you've done something to this muscle, you'll feel it. Going up and down the stairs today, my knee felt as if it'd rusted over. So it's some Tylenol, more ice tonight, and lots of stretches. That way I'll still be able to compete in the tournament on Saturday, and sort Christmas presents for Angel Tree on Sunday! And people say I don't keep myself busy.

Just over a week until Thanksgiving. I'm already making plans for my gingerbread house, which is not to be baked/constructed until the day after Thanksgiving at the very earliest. I think the Christmas tree will have to wait until, oh, December 3rd or so. I might be just a wee bit too tired to do anything about it before then. The big question is, do I use sour Skittles on my gingerbread house this year?

All the Leaves are Brown

I've been told that as a grad student in my major, I'll learn what the definition of negative time is. I'm thinking I might be there already. 9 days before a test, I'm already studying. I never study for tests. Never. Until I started this year. There's just so much to learn.

I'm also on my way to one of the biggest tests of my life in karate. It's scary and exciting and exhausting. I apparently tweaked my knee on Saturday, and it's still a little sore. I'm back up on my trying to jog, too. I've been jogging fairly regularly on the treadmill, except for today because I didn't want to push my knee. I've been instructed to eat, drink, sleep, and breathe karate for the next three weeks. Which I suppose leaves learning my coursework at school solely by osmosis.

Meanwhile, the weather is changing again. We've had drizzle twice in the last three days, and most of our trees (excepting palm trees) are bare of leaves. Although, that might have something to do with the Santa Annas a couple weeks back.

Blogs will probably be getting fewer and farther between. At least for the next four weeks or so. By then I'll be done with finals, and I'll be able to relax by painting my room, or some other such thing.

The Ejection of a Voiceless Alveolar Stop

Got my car back tonight! The difference between my car and the other one is like the difference between a hotel bed and your own comfy bed. That's on the familiarity scale, the comfy scale, and the scale of it fitting you well.

Test in phonetics tomorrow. Vowels of English and consonants of the world. Should be fun. I especially look forward to using diacritics, like aspiration or dentalization, on the test. Nothing better than pressure to throw off a transcription. I just hope my headache goes away by then.

Just across the hall from the room where I have Phonetics Lab, there's an Italian class that gets out just before my Phonetics Lab starts. One of my professors from last semester is in that class, as is one of the students from that professor's class. I found out today, though, that one of the singers from my voice class is there, too. For a school with 35,000 undergraduates, I sure see people I know a lot.

The Road goes Ever on and On

Last night on my way home from karate, my car's "check engine" light came on again. It's been alternating between off and on for the last week or so. After it came on last night, it flashed again and went steady again. And then it flashed, all the way home. During this time, the car started to rattle/complain whenever I tried to accelerate, my gas mileage went down the drain, and my car smelled hot when I got home. So we dropped it off at the shop last night for work today: faulty/malfunctioning fuel injector. 3 hours of labor. 1 unhappy driver, who still doesn't have her car back.

And I got to drive the car that my brother would be driving if he had his license, but he doesn't have his license yet. I'd forgotten about the, erhm, characteristic sounds that the other car made. Sounds something like this: "pbbbbtbbbbpbbbbtbbbb." Repeat ad nauseum. And the radio says "ptoobptk" every time you try to turn it on. But the heater does work, even if the gears are broken in the driver's window.

To Blog, or not to Blog

Just to let y'all know, the fact that I don't blog on some days doesn't mean I don't want to. It means I'm tired by the time 10:00 pm or so rolls around. When was the last time I blogged? Who knows. I don't feel like looking at the date because, umm, I'm tired. Seems to be a constant this semester. Although, today I feel pretty good in general, because I enjoyed my Friday. Ate a leisurely breakfast, took a bath, went on the treadmill my dad bought years ago at someone's moving sale, read, and went to karate. I even got candy at karate.

Halloween was awesome, too. Honestly, what other day can you see Cinderella and Captain Hook walking to the bus stop together? I also saw a clown driving out of a grocery store parking lot. Then, in the commons, there was Snow White, her step-mother, an evil fairy, a dude in a pink bunny outfit (the kind your grandma used to make you wear for Easter; I think he must have lost a bet), a prairie woman, and a couple of Asian kids whose costumes I couldn't quite decipher, but they were still cool.

I went walking around a random neighborhood with one of my friends on Halloween night, in our matching-ish costumes. Awesome stuff. Although, I found out I can't back up properly in her driveway at night. Normally I'm great backing down driveways, but this one just isn't very user-friendly at night. Thank goodness there's not a whole lot of shrubbery around.

I got a 93% on my last Hearing and Speech Sciences class, whee! The class average didn't change much, which is sad. Sad for other people. Of course, there's no curve, so my being two standard deviations away doesn't help me that much. But I still feel good. Now I almost have a B+ in there. I think my presentation in my music class went well yesterday, too. Now I just have to study for a test Tuesday, a test Thursday, the Writing Proficiency Assessment on Saturday, make flash cards for this next unit of Hearing and Speech Sciences as we go, practice karate like there's no tomorrow, finish an afghan, sew a nightgown and an apron, write a reaction to a Deaf Awareness Day I went to, write a response to a technical article for my music class, all by the middle of December. Oh, and I still have no idea what to do for over half of the people that I need to get Christmas presents for.