no linkie for you

Well, nuts. Google just changed some links around and they took out a direct link from your Gmail to Blooger. That super sucks. Or how about thuper thuckths? Good grief, me and another student got silly in French today saying "What would a French person with a lisp sound like?"

Speaking of the sillies... here we go.

My French teacher talked about how cheese is serious bidnez in France and how when she was over there they would go "You have to learn how to cut the cheese."
*snicker*

My history teacher... I can't even fully explain how this happened, but it did and he erased it before I could get a cell phone pic of it. He wrote Treaty of Paris on the board but it totally came out looking like Treaty of Penis. Probably why he erased it fairly quickly.

I am really enjoying that guy now, especially since I understand a little better how his lectures and storytelling go. Today he got a little deep into what he calls "Sex and sin scandals". He keeps saying these wry wit humor jokes that get me. I can't even remember all of them and I sure wish I could. But one of them was he handed a girl her graded paper and says "18. That's a good score. *pause* Out of 500." I don't know. I sure wish I could remember some of the other things that he says. This guy is indeed a gem.

He is a great teacher because I really hate history and don't care to study it, but now he has me wanting to explore more and more about most everything he talks about.

I'm still working through life here. It's just been a few really difficult things I don't want to talk about right now. But the outcome looks pretty good right now.

While I'm editing to fix a typo, I'd also like to say I wish I could write down some flashes of memories before they vanish. I seem to have a memory pop into my head and then before I can really write anything, I get distracted and it goes away. Oh well, not a big deal.

forget gesundeit

Well, life has been emotionally difficult and tumultuous for me... but I won't be going into that.

I thought I would share a quick funny moment of my day today. In French class a girl sneezed and this guy turns to her and says "Salut". I chuckled inwardly about it and the next thing I knew my teacher was giggling to herself so bad she had to put her book down. The guy really had no idea what he did wrong.

It's like this in English:

Person A: *A-choo*

Person B: HI!

Not really a whole lot to say lately. Just plodding away at school and life. Dealing with homework, studying for tests and working on this bureaucratic mess called financial aid and higher education.

It has not been fun.

Shmoo Story Time

I have another amusing story I'll try to paint for y'all. That's right, y'all. Deal.

Anyways, I used to be a school bus driver. I had this really awesome job where I did almost nothing but field trips. I loved the traveling. I went to Denver a million times, I got a bus stuck in the mud in Alamosa and I took a lovely overnight trip to Glenwood Springs. (but that trip had some unfortunate issues.)

Well, the thing I want to talk about right now is one trip up to Denver. I drove some middle school kids to the state capitol building where they were to stay all day. I was allowed to bring my husband with me on these trips, so he came that day. We hung out on the 16th Street Mall and walked around. It was so fun and I was paid to do this!

Ok. I just spent 30 minutes searching for these photos on some discs I burned last year. This post totally needs pictures. But that 30 minutes wasn't much fun.

Anywho... here we go.
This is Shmoo. This is my husband Ryan lugging the Shmoo down 16th Street Mall.


We bought Shmoo in some odd shop on the 16th Street Mall. He's carved out of wood and he's pretty darn heavy. Ryan talked the lady into giving us a discount for him. I love anything ferret and otter related. And other creatures of course in the mustilidae family.

Here is Shmoo posing in front of the Colorado State Capitol in Denver. (the buses get to park in front of this place for free.) Not to mention that is where the field trip people are.


Here is Shmoo on the bus getting ready for his big ride home. The people on this field trip got the biggest kick out of Shmoo. They even took pictures of him on their cell phones.


And this is just the odd fun we like having with Shmoo. We like to dress him up. He happens to have a "Happy Mother's Day" balloon around his neck... I don't know exactly why. The Shmoo attracts odd things.

Mushrooms go down in history

I don't know if I can paint this picture correctly.

Ok. My history teacher is a wisp of a man, about 60 years old and feisty as hell. But he's not necessarily frail either, he cross country skis and hikes, etc. He is just a character.

In the classroom there are sliding white boards, and so he slides one out from under the map he has posted over half the board. Lurking underneath the map a fine mushroom illustration. My teacher finishes up his sentence, but you can see the wheels turning in his head as he grazes upon this fungus drawing.

The young juvenile delinquent dude fine upstanding young man is giggling away behind me, I know what he's thinking about.

My history teacher rolls with it and starts talking about how when women were abused centuries ago by their husbands they would then serve the delightful fellow some mushroom soup. I think it should be called "Husband Be Gone" soup.

Tee hee!

I quit. Ok, I don't quit. But I'm going to quit.

Ha. Welcome to my little emotional world. It's hard being married and living with parents at the same time. Add to that trying to get a college degree and it can almost push you over the edge.

Well, actually another added ingredient can attribute... the government. Let's just say a couple things about this, shall we? First of all, we live on disability. I had to close a retirement account last year just to help pay some bills. I had a work study of which I earned $1200. My adjusted gross income was $6000. Ryan got $8000 in disability pay.

And yet FAFSA thinks that we can afford to pay $4600 of my tuition. To put this into a little more context... let me tell you another little story. When I first applied at FAFSA 2 years ago I had to include my wages of being a school bus driver, which amounted to about $14,000. And yet I got full grants without any battles and my EFC (estimated family contribution) was $0.

Add up $6000 and $8000, what do you get? Oh! $14,000. And yet now they think we can shell out 35% of our income? (2 years ago we didn't have the disability benefits.) I just can't believe that they say at $14,000 for two people that I do not qualify for the Pell Grant.

I do not know what the full story is here... but I've got to say... just because we receive disability *snort* benefits, that seems to be the governments way of saying "That was gift money. And now we want half of it back if you want to go to school and better yourself, please."

Please. How does one person, let alone two, live on $8000 per year? I don't know what poor Ryan would do if he didn't have me. I feel sad for the disabled people out there who don't have the fortune of families.

I just don't know. I could go on and on about all this, but frankly I'm not in the mood. I could make mention about how I know a guy who was in the Army for 3 years and now receives $2000 a month in benefits. And I could tell you about how he has the biggest, baddest home theater system, computers and motorcycles galore and the government doesn't bug him about the money they give him.

I also know the world is not fair. Doesn't really make it easier to live with a short stick though.

Oh and the college thing... I really might quit if I really can't get financial aid. We'll find out on Friday I suppose. I have to wait for the FAFSA application to process first, then I'll go to my future college's advising office and pray that I can be helped by someone who really knows their stuff.

And if can get the financial aid that I really am deserving to receive I'll just hang in there and tough it out. For another two years.
Earlier today though I was fed up and wanted to just quit everything for good regardless of the outcome of financial aid.

We shall see. I really hope I do get a competent financial aid officer that can help me.

ETA:
But I just had to add one more thing...

Last year when I had to "fight" for my financial aid because last year FAFSA thought that I could afford $3800 out of my pocket for tuition... The financial aid advisor told me about a person she helped earlier that day who has all these benefits from fighting in Iraq - $80,000 to be exact.

And yet that person didn't have to pay a dime and got full grants. *sigh*

In it to attempt to win it

Well, frankly... you can't win the dang fangled lottery unless you actually play.

So I need to try at least a little bit, huh? I had a dream once that my mom won it and she showed me the ticket but I could only make out the first few numbers. DARN IT. I totally want one of those dreams where the numbers, all of them, come to you in a dream and even if it takes years, you actually win!

La la la.

My dad once got 5 out of 6 numbers. Stupid thing is you only get, like, $500 for that. Come on. You would at least expect $5000 or something, sheesh.

Février heureux

Hmmm, I just took some prenatal vitamins along with an extra dose of biotin (because it didn't have any biotin in the first place, oddly enough) and I'm feeling pretty good right now. I know B-vitamins are good for regulating stress and mood sometimes. Sweet. :-) Let's keep on feeling goood.

(oh and I'm not pregnant nor do I plan to be. I'm taking these vitamins for my hair health and my PCOS doesn't hate it either.)

School... school... school. Do I have anything to say about school? Not really. Except that I am really getting good and sick of homework. And I still have at least 2 more years to go. *sigh*

I have lots to do regarding school. Big to-do list. Gotta do taxes so I can fill out FAFSA. Gotta try and make some appointments with various advisors at new school so I can figure out which end is up. Hopefully the good end.

I am sorry for this being so boring, but it is what it is right now.
French is driving me up the wall. History is a bit better because I think I've finally got a grasp for how my prof teaches, thinks and lectures. My French teacher is wonderful though, she's so cool.
Then geography... I'm kinda annoyed because I want to be more into landforms and GIS things, but my 4 year university is making it mandatory for me to take this human geography and world regional geography. I don't mind it really, but it feels like I'm learning about plumbing when I want to be an auto mechanic.