this is the way i live

Wednesday, October 5, 2011 (10:22pm) - Indian Ocean

hi friends! today was sea olympics aboard the mv explorer. that means another "study day" that wasn't actually a study day. depressing. but, we are broken into "seas" based on what hall we live on in the ship. for example, i live on deck 3 forward starboard (so much nautical lingo, i know) so i'm in the yellow sea! so we had to come up with yellow sea cheers, make a yellow sea banner, and dress in yellow. it kind of reminded me of the first day of spring semester when every girl is wearing their given sorority shirt right after recruitment. because even if i don't know every girl wearing an AXO shirt, i do know we're sisters, so therefore we are friends. just like today... i don't know everyone in my hall, but if they were wearing anything yellow, we were besties today.

anyways... back to sea olympics, every sea puts teams together and competes in a bunch of different events. some events today included a backward spelling contest, popcorn eating contest, synchronized swimming contest, and musical chairs, just to name a few. to get points you had to place in the top 4 for each given event. i really wanted to participate in volleyball, but i'm still kinda sick so i didn't. but our team still did fairly well. maddy participated in the human knot/lap sitting contest. i have no idea what that even means, so ask her. looking at the scoreboard at the activities desk throughout today, it didn't look like we were doing very hot. i spent most of the day in bed again, trying to fully recover from this annoying cold because i have a lot to do this week. i wrote a couple papers and have one more to write before bed. so that means i didn't really watch a lot of the events. but i DID make it to dinner. why?? TACO NIGHTTTTT!!!!! not even good mexican food, but at this point any mexican food is good. AND they had chicken fajitas!!!! (last time they only had ground-beef... gross). so i was one happy girl. two chicken fajitas tacos, rice, beans, and like a plate of guacamole (again, not good... but i'll live). oh my goodness i was so happy.

then after dinner was the closing ceremonies (opening ceremonies were at 9am). all the seas sat in their designated area of the union. the "sea squirts" (dependent children) were awarded the neptune award (no idea what that means). they were really excited and it was really cute. then dean jill told us "i know you guys have all been waiting for news on cuba..." (edge of our seats!) and that as of the first week of october, SAS needed to come up with a plan-b since we still don't have the travel license that would allow us to go there. so we OFFICIALLY changed our port from cuba to... wait for it... GUATAMALA!!!!! what a tease that was. we were all on the edge of our seats ready to lose our shit when she said "we're going to cuba djfka;dj;ajd" but nooooo!!!! but if we do end up getting the travel license in time, then we will change it back to cuba... but as of now we will be going to guatamala. why haven't we received our travel license yet? first because of the lifelong learners. obama recently signed a bill allowing students to go to cuba... but technically lifelong learners aren't students. so that's an issue. and then dean jill told us that our travel license is stuck in the treasury. i didn't even know they had anything to do with it... but with the state of the economy, i guess a bunch of spoiled college students' cuban travel license might not be the top priority. though i don't understand why not. so guatamala it is for now. kind of bummed... cus i really wanted to be able to have said i had gone to cuba. but i guess i'll live. now i need to come up with a game plan for guatamala. i have no idea what there is to do there. i don't even know if we have guidebooks for it in the library. this is awkward. so... any suggestions out there? hit me up.

thennn after this piece of heartbreaking news, dave announced the winners of the sea olympics! out of 10 seas, we came in 4th!!! so that means we get to get off the ship fourth when we land in fort lauderdale! which is good, because i think my flight is at like 5:30ish pm... so if i got off at 8am i would be chillin in the airport all day. not fun.

and as for the title of this blob... the song "the way i live" by baby boy da prince (normalll) has been stuck in my head for like three weeks. i have no idea why... this song was cool sophomore year of high school maybe. but i can't help it. so i've been listening to it all day. this and desperado. haha i can't get that song out of my head either. what is wrong with me? speaking of songs though... on our news channel a few days ago there was an article listing the top 10 downloads on itunes... i knew 2 of them. i'm gonna come home and know NOTHING. so stressful.

well i need to go write another paper. why do they think i should be in school? but brewer and i just spent an hour trying to figure out our schedules for next semester which is my favorite game to play. looks like i'll be taking more awesome classes! so weird that i have to plan next semester where they think i should be in class 5 days a week. every week. where's my 8 day weekend in vietnam? wtf. haha okay well paper, shower, then bed for me. love you all!