Ready, Set, Go

It's the day before Thanksgiving - one more day until the holidays have officially begun.  In celebration (and preparation), I intend to be baking all day - mmmmm apple-blueberry crisp and ginger snaps.  The ginger snaps will be a repeat from a recipe I tried a couple days ago in Vermont.  They were so perfectly soft, spicy, and delicious that they will be a feature of tomorrow's renowned meal.

Now that I'm back in New Jersey, I've got to alter my mindset a bit.  Time to focus on my co-op (4 more days!) and ramping up for Christmas.  Instead of facing the crowds of overzealous (and, frankly, terrifying) shoppers on Black Friday, I intend to unwind from fall quarter with a massage and by digging through Christmas decorations.  And, of course, watching Christmas movies (Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Elf, and Nightmare Before Christmas, anyone?)  The second that Thanksgiving is over, I will be ready for Christmas carols, trees, wreaths, lights, and, of course, snow.  Hear that, Rochester? Bring. It. On.

I've recently been fighting my inability to finish book series by listening to Harry Potter 7 on audio book.  Yeah, I know - BLASPHEMY, I never read it.  Well now I am reading it.  Kind of.  So I want to reread the whole series since I can hardly remember what horcruxes are, let alone how they relate to Harry, Ron, and Hermione.  Perhaps that's another goal for winter.  With that, I'll leave you with this stroke of genius prank from New York City's subway system:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_localnyc/mta-offering-service-to-hogwarts-magical-harry-potter-train-line-appears-on-subway-sign?bouchon=501,ny

Happy Thanksgiving!

Chapter closed.

Fall quarter has come to a close here at RIT.  No more classes, no more exams, no more projects, no more presentations.  Just lots of catching up on sleep and inevitable gorging on turkey, stuffing, and mashed potatoes.  With the close of the quarter comes big changes - starting my internship, Christmas time ( :D ), and having my boyfriend be 7 hours away rather than 10 minutes.  Big adjustment there.

Bright side: no homework, no exams, more time to cook and bake, new experiences.
Down side: boredom, no money, daily commutes in the ill-tempered Rochester winter.

But... no time to dwell.  It's time for the holidays!  I'll admit, I cheated a bit... Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas is You" may have been played in my car this evening.  I know, I know, it's not even Thanksgiving yet.  But I can't help it.  I'm excited!  Going home this week means good holiday food, much-needed time with my parents, and hunting around for Christmas decorations that will go unused this holiday season (that is, if it weren't for me and my yet-to-be-decorated apartment :D).

In other news - go see Harry Potter 7.  It's dark, scary, creepy, and sad... but very well done.  My inability to finish reading series has caused me to not read the associated book, but I maintain that it is awesome.  Maybe I'll shlep up the entire series to Rochester upon my post-Thanksgiving return to eventually reread (hooray, distractions).  I also intend to capitalize upon ABC Family's 25 Days of Christmas (no homework, remember?), which I believe will be an exquisite use of my time.  Oh and Netflix Gods, prepare to be sending me DVDs more often now.  I will make sure I actually chip away at my recently-renewed queue this time.  Pinkie promise.

Goals for the winter: make a snowman in my patio area, see as many RIT hockey games as possible, not go broke, learn lots of things at my internship, and survive in general.  See? My priorities are in line - snowman first, survive last.  Sounds about right.

Such a discovery.

I sit on my bed inadvertently listening to Ben Folds as I update (or rather, completely revamp) my long-ignored Netflix queue.  You're welcome, Netflix Gods, it is my pleasure to finally return those movies I have been hoarding since two summers ago.  The Internet is delivering to me recipes of hopefully delicious holiday desserts to the foodie in me as I simultaneously hop back and forth between Wikipedia and my Human Biology grades.  Ah week 10, how I have missed you.  Though, unlike every other RIT student, I am not procrastinating at the moment.  I really have nothing to do.  Mostly because I have one class tomorrow and the only preparation it calls for is to bring my textbook to slam my head against for 110 minutes straight.  At least it's the last class.  More like thank god it's the last class.

As the title suggests, I have made an epic discovery.  At least it's epic in my mind. While I have known that my favorite television past time (Bones, of course! And no, I don't just like it for Agent Booth thankyouverymuch.  I'm more of a Hodgins girl anyway) is based off of the life and work of real-life forensic anthropologist, Kathy Reichs, it has never dawned on me that I might actually like her novels.  Well, it finally has. And I have the first two books of her fourteen-book series en route to my apartment this very instant. Assuming Amazon is on top things. Which I'm sure they are. So I am quite excited. Because remember my previous post? The one where I mentioned that I need to find things to do to avoid driving myself crazy? Yeah, this might help.

In other news, I'm thinking about reaching back into my German roots to make some of these soon:

http://www.kingarthurflour.com/blog/2010/10/29/holiday-baking-traditions-german-lebkuchen/

Lebkuchen.  It'll bring me back to my Kaffeestunde days of high school. Also perfect for the holidays, which I am ramping up for! Broke college student about to embark on an unpaid internship... yet I remain excited for the most consumerist-driven time of year. But not for that consumerism bit. Just all the warmth, spices, and happiness that comes along with it. Yes, I am an optimist. And I'm one of those psychos who really loves this time of year. Halloween's over and I am READY. Bring it on, Holiday Season!

Time to try this out for real.

Winter is fast approaching in Rochester and I'm getting antsy.  Big things are happening around me and I'm trying to keep track of them all.  I'm coming up with ideas of what I want to do with my soon-to-be college degree and I'm about to find out for real if I'm on the right track with an internship at local advertising agency Martino Flynn.  I'm realizing I have a deep interest in cooking (thank you, Top Chef) and am about to have time to explore that notion.  With my boyfriend shipping off to D.C. for 6 months, I'm about to have a lot of time on my hands and god knows I need to fill it with something or I'll drive myself crazy.

I'm being bombarded with glorious thoughts of travel across the globe.  I just keep on planning out what cities and cultures I want to experience - thoughts of exotic foods, famous architecture, loud and happy culture flood my mind.  I'm about thisclose to buying a world map and sticking it to my wall with colorful push pins designating where I want to go and where I need to go again.

I can't necessarily attribute my travel obsession to my current read, but I can certainly recommend it:

It's the story of a man who gets dumped at the altar.  The beginning is tragically sad, but his decision to travel the world with his brother on a two-year long "honeymoon" makes the book undeniably fascinating.  I'm only about halfway through it now, but his jaunt through Croatia, Russia, Sweden, Bulgaria, and Romania so far has proven to hold my attention.  I have to thank StumbleUpon for delivering http://www.honeymoonwithmybrother.com/ to me... it's feeding my hunger for travel (at least for now).