The final paper for HIST 308, my final undergraduate assignment, had to be turned in outside Dr. Miller's office by 10 this morning. I set two alarms last night, and I didn't sleep very deeply. It would have been just too perfect to sleep through the deadline of my last final here, after sleeping through one of my very first finals back when I was a freshman. Luckily, I only needed the first alarm, and I got the paper turned in with plenty of time to spare. There was one parallel between my first and last semesters, though. Freshman year, when I woke up an hour after my Art History final started, I sprinted across campus in my pajamas. This year, I was strolling in my pajamas, just because I've given up on college, life, and wearing real clothes.

There was a Kindt group meeting today, like every Tuesday. I didn't have to go, but since I forgot about last week's, I thought it'd be nice to show up one last time. It was very nice, because I got to sit and think about how I'll never have to think about statistical mechanics or polymer chemistry, ever again, in my LIFE.

I spent the rest of the day pre-packing, which basically means throwing out a lot of stuff. I'm the type of person who keeps everything, from books to class notes, just in case I need it one semester. It turns out I'm a lot less of a pack rat when I don't have another semester to hold stuff for. I got a whopping $36 for my books, and gave the rest to a book drive. And just outside my door, I have a stack of papers for recycling. I don't think the stack will end up taller than me, but right now it comes up to about halfway up my shin.

In lieu of eating actual food for dinner tonight, I went to Dante's Down the Hatch with a group of APhiOers, basically the same ones from Friday's barbecue. We did the chocolate fondue thing, which is only done for one group a night. It was amazing. The spread of fruit was huge, the chocolate was delicious...totally worth the $200+ dollars it cost. Best moment of the night would probably have to be Chelsea's lament when the pots of chocolate were brought out: "But it's not big enough for my FACE!!"

You know, back in the day, I wondered how seniors could even be friends with freshmen and sophomores. After all, I figured that they should be busy doing seniory things with other seniors? I was wrong about that, as I was about many things back then. Now I've got friends who have two or even three years left here, and it's like...you guys get to continue here after I'm gone? Really? How is that fair? Of course, days away from graduation, I'm glossing over all the times I hated Emory and school in general. If you take away things like housing debacles, pchem, and the SURE program, it was really four years of nonstop fun!

People always say that their college years were the best years of their lives. (Except for my high school English teacher, who told us that her senior year of high school was the best year of her life.) I don't know what purpose that little piece of info is supposed to serve, but it scares me just a bit. I'm 21, hopefully I've got quite a bit of life ahead of me, surely the best bits can't be behind me....right?

I'm off to campus, to finish the last two academic obligations of my undergraduate career. I have to finish organizing all my data spreadsheets, so they can be handed off to Dr. Kindt. I actually had eight pages' worth of things to say about Napoleon and Germany, so today I just have to clean it up. Make it flow, if you will. It'll take some time this evening to do all the formatty things, and then I have to make sure and set my alarm tonight so I get the thing turned in by the 10am deadline. 10am! Crazy!

I also get to pick up my newly-arrived Blue October CD. They just released an album a couple of weeks ago, but Pandora plays an older one, so the older one is what I bought. Pandora is controlling my life. Can't say I mind that much.

I joined the Facebook the other day. My first friend was actually Graham from high school, whom I hadn't spoken to in years. So that was pretty neat. Other than that, I have yet to feel the pull of addiction. I'll keep everybody posted.

I got this really sweet email today--

Subj: With Admiration!

"To The Freshmen Organic Class of 2002"

I would like to extend my warmest "Congratulations" to each and everyone of you for all the achievements and success that you have enjoyed during your College career. You belong to the second generation of a one time "freshmen group" who dared to come into my classroom, and proved to me convincingly how truly gifted some of the students that come to Emory really are.

In addition to the names honored with this message, I would like to mention the names of those who who left the College earlier: [a list including my orgo lab partner, who annoyed me but may have actually known it all, and several other people who I didn't know graduated early. No wonder I haven't been seeing them around.]

This summer I will embark in the recruiting of our sixth freshmen class, and just like the classes that followed yours, they will most definitely join in the tradition of high academic standards and unique personal relationships that were set by the "Freshman class of 2002".

With my perennial admiration, and my best wishes for not only a most rewarding professional career, but also a fulfilled personal life!

Jose.

----

That's from Dr. Soria, who taught me organic chemistry my first semester here, and was on my thesis committee for my last semester. He's a great guy, and I'm sure he's a great professor. I say "I'm sure" because my perspective on the matter is skewed. I was nowhere near ready for his style of teaching during my first semester. I went to a challenging high school, but we had graded homework. After doing all the assignments, I would study, at maximum, one hour for a test and half and hour for a quiz. And I did wonderfully. One semester junior year, I had a GPA of 5.0.

I entered Emory with a fundamental misconception of the value of homework. I thought it only existed to be graded, and didn't realize that by doing all the assignments I was actually practicing the concepts I'd learned. I was a dumb freshman. Anyway, we didn't have homework in freshman orgo. So I never cracked open the book, except for that half hour for quizzes and hour for exams.

You'd think the first time I got a 32%, I'd have thought, "Maybe I'm doing something wrong." Oh no. It was more like, "I'm LaKedra, I'm brilliant, why is this guy such a bad teacher?" So I kept on doing absolutely nothing outside of class. Then I'd go to lectures, where Dr. Soria would explain concepts in a way that probably made things very clear for those who'd done the readings and practiced on their own. To me, it seemed that he was drawing random things on the board, soliciting random guesses, and moving on. I was so frustrated. I was so dumb!

I got a B- that first semester, which... whoa. But it still wasn't my fault, and I was really glad when Dr. Soria was replaced by Dr. Goldsmith for the second semester of freshman orgo. Goldsmith didn't give homework either, but his lecture style was more accessible to those who hadn't done the reading. Maybe it was that small thing that led to my epiphany. I could begin to understand the concepts just from lecture, so it encouraged me to work on my own to fully grasp the material. As opposed to never beginning to understand, and so never trying. I started to spend a lot more time doing practice problems and examples from the book. Or maybe it was just the fear of getting another B-, I dunno. I got an A- that semester, and my GPA never looked back (until stat mech).

I asked Dr. Soria to be on my Honors committee because I wanted him to see that I did get a clue, and was no longer this dumb, entitled freshman with no sense of initiative. I've grown a lot since then, and he was a big part of that.

Alrighty. Global Health was actually my last class at Emory. We did evaluations, and I basically ripped the class apart. Constructively, of course. There's really no point to just being scathing without saying anything. So I talked about how the class has a lot of potential, and will draw in lots of students, because I feel Global Health is a pretty popular subject among Emory students. But the utter lack of organization on the part of the professor made the whole thing feel like a waste of time. (We finally got the assignment for the take-home essay part of our final. Of course he had to push the due date back, since it was almost a week late.) I did compliment the choices for guest speakers and the documentaries we saw, so I wasn't completely negative.

After class ended forever, Kathryn and I were picked up by Kathryn's old roommate, and we went out for coffee. It was pretty fun, but for some reason my eyes were killing me the whole time. It probably didn't help that we first went to a Kirkland's-like store. Any store that sells decorative balls for $13 also has tons of scented candles and bath stuff and usually makes my allergies flare up. I felt okay after we got to Starbucks and I had my first caramel chai in a long, long time.

After that, I had enough time to check my email before fellowship chapter. My last chapter as an active in Delta Kappa. You know, as many times as it caused annoyance or frustration, APhiO has defined seven of my eight semesters here, and... I'm obviously not ready to write about that in any depth, so I'm going to move on as soon as I can see the monitor again.

Fellowship chapter was fun.

Afterwards, some of us went to the No Strings Attached spring concert. It was very good. Of course, White Hall was packed. Major fire hazard. I was so excited to actually be sitting in a chair at a No Strings concert, I could barely contain myself. (Quote of the night: "What would you do for a good seat? Who would you do for a good seat?") Anyway, one of the departing seniors was in my freshman orgo class, and it was neat to see him being sent off. The other departing senior, I swear I've never seen at a No Strings performance in my life. He forgot the words to two of the songs he soloed. Maybe he was just emotional, or something. But the concert was really good, and the best part was when they performed the alma mater. As usual, the president of the university went up to sing with them. But this time, he actually had a little solo (the "crowned with love and cheer," for those who know the song). Any tears that may have been threatening to fall were chased away by that little moment. Thanks, President Wagner.

The next two weeks are going to be crazy.

This morning, I walked out of my last class* at Emory. The asterisk is because it wasn't technically my last class, but the last class that I care about. The last class in which I learned anything. Dr. Starnes didn't actually lecture; she put together a little slideshow of images from the semester. The slideshow was set to "The Way We Were," by Barbara Streisand. Dr. Starnes made sure to point out the lines about "If we had the chance to do it all again..." SO CHEESY. Of course I cried. But just a little, like two tears. Shut up.

I still have one class left, Global Health. That exam is in a couple of days, and I'm sure it hasn't been written yet. On Wednesday, we were supposed to receive instructions for a take-home essay portion. On Friday, we were told that the instructions would be up on Sunday. It's still not up. At least I'll have something to say in my very last course evaluation. Should be fun.

My Panic factorial at the Disco CD just arrived, so I'm going to go have a listen.

Friday was my last day of thesis-related stuff! I woke up earlier than usual that morning, because I wanted to stop by Dr. Kindt's office before Human Phys. A combination of the earliness, and the fact that some classes had already ended, meant that I was the only person up in the apartment. I'm used to seeing at least two of the roommates in the morning, so it was weird to feel like I was the only person around. It felt so wrong, that when I walked into the empty kitchen, my first worried thought was, "Is today a day?" I actually turned to go back into my room and check. Dunno what I was going to check, just that I needed to make sure that it was, in fact, a day.

Once I got all that sorted out, I went to the chem building and had Dr. Kindt sign the preliminary pages of my thesis. Then I went to Human Phys, where we learned stuff as always. Then I went over to White Hall and turned in my thesis. I was convinced that the coordinator would find something wrong with my margins or my formatting or something, and I'd have to fix it and I STILL wouldn't be done. She measured my margins, flipped through all the pages, and said "You're good. Congratulations!" And that was that. The thing that had taken over so much of my life, over and done with. I had the biggest grin on my face as I left the building.

I then went to the Revenge of Slack-a-Thon, or whatever they were calling it. Since it rained on Wednesday and they had to shut it down, it was held again on Friday. There was actually free food the second time, so that was nice. I meant to stay and collect money for maybe half an hour, but I ended up staying for almost three. After all, I didn't have any thesis stuff to work on!

It feels good to be a senior!

I was pretty tense last night, and I didn't sleep very well. For the first time in a long time, I was awake enough to press 'snooze' instead of turning off the alarm and oversleeping by 20 minutes. Today's Human Phys lecture was about a fairly important pathway that I wanted to understand, so I went to that class. I wore pajamas, OF COURSE. Then I went to participate in the Slack-a-Thon, this charity fundraising thing. I couldn't truly slack, though, because my mind was on my thesis. So I came back here and forced myself to listen to music and do nothing until it was time to get dressed and head over to the chemistry building.

I was soooo nervous about the presentation (sweating like CRAZY!), but it went well. JK was cool, and Dr. Soria didn't say a whole lot. Dr. Family was the wild card, since I didn't know him, and he's pretty much an expert on the stuff. However, he seemed more fascinated by the project than eager to rip it apart. And so after my little presentation, they deliberated for a few minutes, and I got highest honors! At normal schools, that'd be summa cum laude. But at a normal school, the whole honors thing would only be based on GPA and I'd probably be a level lower, so no complaints here!

Right after that I went to a little goodbye party for one of the Emerson Center's system administrators. There was cake with whipped icing! And after that there was the Chemistry Department's senior banquet and awards ceremony. I got the Excellence in Chemistry award, which I wasn't expecting at all.

I went straight from there to Exec, and after that, was FINALLY able to get out of my dressy clothes. And since then, I haven't been able to do anything but sit and stare blankly at my TV or monitor. Fun!

Highest.

Today was the last day of defense prep. JK recommended that I learn the chemical structure of this phospholipid that kind of exhibits the behavior I've been simulating all this time. This frustrated me for a while, because I am SPOILED by the internet. I couldn't find the structure anywhere. Then I slapped myself upside the head, and remembered that I could just find the IUPAC name, be a chemistry major and figure the thing out myself. I did that, no problem.

From there, I went on to reviewing all the theoretical stuff. Namely, being able to derive the equations I use. As of now, I can start with an empty lattice, fill it with polymer molecules, and go from there to end up with an equation for entropy of mixing that's about as long as I am tall. None of the sources I use bother to go into the nitty-gritty of simplifying that equation. I've tried semi-valiantly, and I just don't have the algebraic skills to do it. Hopefully, I'll be able to turn to my audience and say "And now let us agree, as chemists do, that this simplifies like so," then move on. That's if I'm even asked to derive the equation in the first place. I might have gone through all the trouble for nothing.

I have a couple more things to do. Off I go!

I was pretty happy today, which apparently puts me in the minority. Everybody's sick, or angry, or sad, or frustrated, or just generally snappish. However, I'm feeling pretty good. I'm sure that will change soon.

I didn't actually do much work today. I went to Human Phys, where Starnes lectured in her usual style, with lots of questions to the class. It was sad, because I remembered knowing all the stuff this time last year, right before the MCAT. I guess I had a brain dump or something. It wasn't a big deal, because there are plenty people in the class who are taking the MCAT in a week and a half. They know all that stuff.

I was really sleepy during class, so I came back here to nap. However, the second I got back, I became really energized. Well, energized enough to goof off until it was time to go to Global Health. Where I did fall asleep. Sigh. We got our midterms back today, and that pissed me off a bit. I'll just say that 'Food (adequate nutrition)' and 'food supplementation' are the same thing. If not exactly the same, they're the same enough to both get full points on an exam in a joke class.

Speaking of which, on Monday the professor was trying to illustrate some point. I couldn't tell you exactly what. To set up his analogy, he asked, "What's an example of a joke class?" Moments like that, the ol' internal dialogue comes in really handy. It's all that stopped Kathryn and me from saying the same thing ('This one?'), at the same time, in the same tone of voice, as we are wont to do. There were a few seconds of awkward silence, and eventually the prof settled on 'Underwater basketweaving'.

After class, I came back here and still failed to either sleep or do work. And then it was time for exec. We had to have a closed (just exec members) meeting after the regular one, for like, the seventh straight exec meeting. This is my fifth semester of going to APhiO exec meetings, and we've had more closed execs this semester than in the other four put together. I think our president might honestly be going 'round the bend, so to speak. Is a long debate really necessary for...oh, never mind. We're all almost done.

Best moment of the day...

Me: Okay, what am I thinking right now?
Minoo: I don't read minds, I see the future.
Me: Okay, then what will I be thinking later?

And finally, only I could spend an hour and a half adding information to a paper and have it come out 89 words shorter.

Goodnight!

Okay, I have a confession to make. I didn't mention this thing until yesterday, and I haven't been very enthusiastic when talking about it. But the truth is, ever since the moment I found out about it, I was living for tonight's Spoon concert. It was the last thing I thought about at night, it was the reason I got up in the morning. I've liked, if not loved, every single Spoon song I've heard on Pandora. Basically, the only thing I wasn't vastly understating was "I Turn My Camera On"'s place as one of last year's best songs.

Why have I been living a lie? Because the last time I was this psyched about a Dooley's Week event, the performer, Mitch Hedberg, died the day before the show. I just couldn't bring myself to have a big Spoon countdown, to incessantly quote Spoon songs, to call it Spoon Week instead of Dooley's Week... all stuff I did last year with Mitch. I tried to play it cool. But now I don't have to, so I can say- it was AWESOME.

They played a nice long set. Of course, now I can't remember the set list. I knew quite a few of the songs, but there were several that I hadn't heard before. They started with "Everything Hits at Once," and then maybe "They Never Got You" and "The Way We Get By." Of course, "I Turn My Camera On" was a huge highlight. Especially when the bassist messed up the bassline spectacularly (I think his finger slipped) and looked up at us with the most hilarious "Crap, did they notice?" expression. Really smooth. It's not like the bassline is the most prominent part of that song, or anything. Only that's exactly what it is.

Then they played a song that may have been "Beast and Dragon, Adored", but it was basically just the drummer going crazy and the lights were all green and I told Casey (who was listening on my phone), "This is where Spoon turns into Satan." It was more than a little scary. Monsieur Valentine and Sister Jack were somewhere after that. And then my Spoon knowledge was basically exhausted, but the songs I didn't know were good, too! All in all, a very good show. I'm glad I went.

During the show, the lead singer complimented us on not pelting the stage with stuff. Apparently when they came to play downtown over the summer, they were pelted with water bottles. Of course, at the end of the show some moron had to hurl a spoon onto the stage. So when a band is like, "Thanks for not throwing plastic things at us," the suitable response is to go into your wind-up and throw a metal thing? Brilliant.

I guess the band is pretty glad they didn't go with the name "Steak knife."

Hmm, it turns out 24 can still surprise me every once in a while. And that's all I'm going to say about that.

Today was pretty rough. I think I fell asleep in Human Phys. I feel bad about that, but having to concentrate on cell-mediated immunity was asking an awful lot. I have to give Starnes credit for letting us go when she finished her lecture 10 minutes early. She's normally the type of professor who'd just think of something else to say, or some more details to give.

I tried to nap between classes, but that didn't work out. So I ran some errands, APhiO-related stuff of course. And I did a little bit of lab work. I have a lot of stuff, but now I have to make it actually sound like a paper and not just a string of graphs and tables. That'll probably be the hardest part.

Global Health was okay. We finally got our study guide for the midterm, which I do believe was supposed to be on March 8. Now it's scheduled for Friday, which is smack in the middle of Emory's second visit weekend. So I'll have to make that up, unless I decide not to go. That option is looking better by the second, actually.

Finally, chapter tonight was...epic. We did this planning conference thing, which I didn't think was going to be worth the time. I was pleasantly surprised, however. A LOT more people than I expected to stay were there the whole time! So that was nice. And I don't know abou the other areas, but I got some really good input and ideas regarding the service program. Well, I guess the stuff isn't so much for me, as for the next SVP, whoever that may be.

I went by Bowden Hall to pick up my graded history paper. Turns out, Dr. Miller was expecting a lot more than I was willing to give. For instance, we had to choose two articles from scholarly journals. Apparently, we were also supposed to look through all the sources that were cited in the two articles. Basically, we were expected to do approximately thirty times the research that I actually did. (I chose my two articles, and didn't even read them all the way through until three days before the paper was due.) My B is more than good enough for a Pass/Fail class, but I was still surprised. I just didn't think it was that serious.

Thesis stuff! I spent this afternoon slogging through the data sets. Kicking myself every once in a while for not getting some of this tedious stuff done earlier. This evening, I'll work on the draft some more. Technically, it's already evening, so I should be working now, but I felt the need to post. And think about basketball for a bit.

The first four paragraphs of my thesis:

Equilibrium polymers are formed from the reversible self-assembly of monomers into chain-like aggregates of arbitrary lengths. The reversibility arises from noncovalent association, which in physical systems may include hydrogen bonding, pi-orbital interactions, and other transient associations. The formation of aggregates is susceptible to change with variations in system conditions such as temperature, concentration, and solvent composition.

A wide variety of systems exhibit equilibrium polymerization. Networks of the proteins actin and tubulin assemble and disassemble to form cellular scaffolding. When placed in solvent, amphiphilic molecules such as phospholipids aggregate into spherical micelles, which in turn reversibly form cylindrical (worm-like) macroaggregates.

Reversible formation of chains is one of the simplest and most representative types of self-assembly, and understanding this phenomenon could lead to advances in the fields of biological science and materials science. Processes such as detergency, oil recovery, and lipid transport in the bloodstream all involve systems that exhibit reversible self-assembly. Micellar solutions are a particularly interesting example of this behavior. Like other complex fluid systems, micellar solutions exhibit a mesoscopic length scale, intermediate between micro- and macroscopic. The length scale arises from the properties of the smaller particles from which the monomer units themselves are formed. Characteristic properties that arise from the mesoscopic length scale include: BLAH BLAH BLAH.

Because bonds can form, break, and re-form freely, the chains in equilibrium polymer systems are not of fixed length. Instead, there is a polydisperse distribution of chain lengths about an average value. As system conditions change, this average value also changes in order to minimize free energy. The phenomenon of chain formation arises from the short-ranged bonding interactions between monomers. Meanwhile, the longer-range attractive interactions between the particles of different chains lead to the phenomenon of phase behavior. Specifically, one sees a transition from a dilute low-density phase to a high-density, or condensed, phase. If nonbonded monomers experience no attractions, this condensation transition is not seen.

The third and fourth paragraphs are okay, I think. (Except for the "BLAH BLAH BLAH", currently placeholding until I figure out the characteristic properties of mesoscopic length scales.) The first two paragraphs need to be fleshed out quite a bit more, and paragraphs five through two hundred are all crap. In fact, next to me I have a list of the details I should be adding right now, and corrections I should be making at this very moment. But I just returned from a workout, and I need a little time to cool down before I jump back into the chemistry. So I decided to post here and make you all insanely jealous of me. I know you wish you could be writing about simulated polymer systems. Don't hate!

I thought I was going to have to drive people out to a service project today. That didn't work out, but it's okay because it made me leave my apartment. First, I went by All Fired Up to see about their charity parties. You can reserve their party room, bring a group to paint stuff, and 20% of all the purchases go to the organization/charity of your choice. My pledge-only event at All Fired Up was pretty successful. I'm thinking that if everybody in the chapter was invited, we could get quite a bit of money. And by "we" I mean "the American Cancer Society."

After getting a little pamphlet from the pottery place, I went to Panera for lunch. I had my favorite soup (broccoli cheddar) and my favorite sandwich (portabello and mozarella). I then went to my lab and worked for three straight hours! That's a record for the semester...maybe the school year.

As I left Clairmont this morning, I noticed what looked like a network of hairline cracks across the top half of my windshield. Incredibly thin lines that would catch the sun as I went down the street. It looked like someone had taken a tiny hammer to the pane of glass. That freaked me out just a little bit, because Fiona's only got 3,988 miles on her. She shouldn't be splintering and falling apart. Eventually, it hit me: "Is that spiderweb? Is there a spider living in my car?"

To make a long story short, YES THERE WAS A SPIDER LIVING IN MY CAR. Trying to make its home across the windshield. How could such a thing happen? The beast made an appearance on my rearview mirror. I grabbed a napkin and tried to smush it with one hand, and it leapt onto my lap. So let's recap. My car is moving, I've got one hand on the wheel, and a spider just jumped onto my lap. Did I mention I was trying to make a turn through a five-point intersection at the time? 'Cuz I was. It's a wonder I'm still alive. I only resisted the urge to run away screaming by gritting my teeth and reproaching myself, forcefully, "You HAVE to CONTROL the CAR!" Oh, and slapping my own thighs over and over. I killed the thing and parked safely, so everything was okay.

Tomorrow, Fiona gets cleaned inside and out.

Mom called me at 9:00 this morning to talk about "The Apprentice." Since I didn't have class until 11:30, she woke me from a deep sleep. It wasn't the most coherent conversation. I remember saying "I can't watch The Apprentice, I watch 24..." and then that's it. I don't know what else we talked about. I ended up going back to sleep, and waking up six minutes before I needed to leave for class. After debating with myself (wasting a precious minute in the process), I decided to get up and go. Good thing, because we learned about the failure of the moderate Revolution. Now we get to the crazy stuff.

Lunch with LB was fun. We talked about the future, which is getting closer and closer every day. Stop it, future, you're freakin' me out!

I spent a couple of hours in the lab this evening. It makes me kinda mad at myself to think about how far along I could have been, if I'd only worked consistently over the past year. But then I think about how dead inside I'd also be, and the feeling passes. In all seriousness, I plan to work consistently over the next few weeks, put this whole thesis thing together, and be done with it. That's why I'm staying here over Spring Break. It'll be a fun time.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, KATHRYN!!!

For dinner we (me, Kathryn, Danielle, Casey) went to the Brick Store pub in Decatur. Alas, I was driving, so I did not get to sample any of the ridiculous number of beer flavors they have. Like the one described as 'a brown ale dipped in cheesy bratwurst', or the 'fruit candy...bubblegum' one. Kathryn called it exactly right; I am oh so fascinated when there is a wide variety of things to choose from. She had a German thing and a Czech thing, which I recommended because there was nothing from Slovakia. Neither of those were described as including cheesy bratwurst or bubblegum. I need to go back there when somebody else is driving.

After the pub, we went to All Fired Up and painted pottery! I did a mug. It came out a lot better than the chalice I did the last time I was there. Like, a lot better. I might actually use the mug! If I remember to go back to the place and get it, that is. And then we went to Cold Stone for ice cream. There were so many funny moments during the evening, most involving Kathryn and I thinking or saying the same thing at the same time. Or Kathryn's magical belch, which...I don't even want to talk about it right now. It makes me sad and confused inside.

I need sleep, and I need to study. Tomorrow is Revelation, and then After-Revelation dinner. And then I HAVE to stop spending so much money. No more going out to eat for like, the rest of the month. Not counting trivia.

Reading todays Wheel, I found out that a member of the Chemistry department, Dr. Apkarian, died on Tuesday. He ran the electron microscopy facility, so I don't think he had much interaction with undergrads. In fact, until today, I only knew him as 'motorcycle guy' because he parked his bike right on the sidewalk outside the door of Emerson Hall. Sadly, it was in a motorcycle accident that he died.

Today was the first Friday of the month, which means the campus acapella groups gave a little concert. One of the last concerts of the year. It was only fitting, then that Aural Pleasure did the Counting Crows song "Einstein on the Beach." That was the first song I ever heard the group do, back when I visited Emory during my senior year of high school. Nobody who performed the song then was still in the group today, but it still sounded just as awesome as before. That made me think about the way things will carry on here at Emory after I'm gone...I won't be here, but people who knew me will still be here, and then people who knew people who knew me, onward into the future. Actually...I didn't get that philosophical. I don't do that. Although I have begun to realize that there's a huge number of people whom I see fairly regularly, but will probably never see again after May 15. That's about as heavy as I get.