six days (?!)

Yep, six days to go until graduation. Since it's nearing midnight, it's more like five and a half days. 

The fact that I'm graduating hasn't really hit me yet. It's only during certain moments - taking the last of my pictures off the walls, saying bye to underclassmen not here for senior week, etc - that I realize how quickly the last four years have flown by. Not quite ready to reflect and reminisce yet. 

Well. On a different note - we had our HR final lunch today and we presented our ACs/the reslife office with a snazzy frame filled with matching pictures of us. Yeah, we're sort of the cutest. Shout-out to HIRA for taking these awesome pictures!

 Lots to do before the end of the year. Grand Rapids in a week and BSB/NKOTB in eight days!

Five Things!

OH MY. It's already Friday. Not sure how many pictures I'll have but I definitely have a few things worth celebrating!

1) DONE. WITH. COLLEGE.

2) delicious indian buffet lunch from tandoor!

3) backstreet boys & new kids on the block concert in 13 days!

4) wine and arrested development!

5) emily's cupcakes and cashmere blog. i am in love with her photography!

I went to this new noodle place on Main Street with a couple friends. The food itself wasn't that great but during the 30-minute wait, we went into this cute little market and I have my eye on a few things. I am thinking about heading there tomorrow afternoon - and maybe I'll also get a manicure? Anyhow. the place is adorbs and very photo-worthy. 

I'll end with a couple pictures of Cupcakes and Cashmere's "Apartment Therapy" post. love.

One day, my living space will be just as photo-worthy!

cognitive dissonance

Cognitive dissonance: an uncomfortable feeling caused by holding conflicting ideas simultaneously (courtesy of Wikipedia).

The fact that graduation is impending  (aka 12 days away) is causing all sorts of conflicting ideas. And plenty of discomfort. Not sure if cognitive dissonance is the right phrase for it but that's what I'm going to title this post. I feel like I haven't quite processed what is happening and what will happen, which sucks because the way I make sense of things is by analyzing it in about a hundred ways. I don't think listening to Keane helps, either... sort of puts me in a funk. Well. Some happy thoughts:

1) finished my political islam paper! colloquium left.
2) we had an incredible colloquium potluck last night with a couple rounds of CATCH PHRASE!
3) I'll be feasting on nachos in about a half hour. YUM.
4) I'm going to see my best friends in less than a month!
5) my mom is coming in 8 days!

Alright, some lady gaga before la boca.

ALSO. A first. Youtube video link to one of the prettiest songs (and voices!) - Adele's "Rolling in the Deep"!

Miller's Pond

Today feels like a Friday.. but it's Saturday! I guess time really does fly when you 1) spend hours watching Friends and 2) procrastinate on work. In my defense, I did work relatively hard this morning on my Colloquium paper. In typical Connecticut fashion, it starting pouring at noon, and it was sunny again by 3pm. Go. Figure. I went to Miller's Pond today on my first (and last) outing. I haven't gone hiking/felt "one" with the wilderness since Montana, really, so it was lovely. 

Nature, it really can be your friend. Unless you climb on the rocks.

Tonight is the infamous "Tour de Franzia." In other words, run around campus with a giant box of franzia wine, take pictures, and go crazy. We'll see how this turns out.

Ten Commandments

Two days in a row! Sad but true - I was thinking last night about all the things I wanted to document in this blog... or maybe it was finding reasons to talk about myself in the interweb. Probably a little of both. Out of the many topics up for discussion (including television, heteronormativity, grad school, flower selection, my love for pretzel m&ms, among many others), I'm going to focus on one: the ten commandments (and no, not the Charlton Heston movie*).

*Yes, I did have to look it up just to make sure it was CH in that movie. 


I recently finished re-reading A.J. Jacobs's book called A Year of Living Biblically. Here's how his website describes the book...


The Year of Living Biblically answers the question: What if a modern-day American followed every single rule in the Bible as literally as possible. Not just the famous rules – the Ten Commandments and Love Thy Neighbor (though certainly those). But the hundreds of oft-ignored ones: don’t wear clothes of mixed fibers. Grow your beard. Stone adulterers.

... and so on. I really like his writing style and as I was walking home earlier, I was thinking about the Ten Commandments. It's supposed to be one of the guiding principles for Christian living but I think I regularly break many of these commandments. Granted, I'm not the most religious (or for that matter, spiritual) person out there. But I will be spending the next year of my life among people who are much more attuned to their religions than I am. So maybe this is a good time to reflect on my many flaws and figure out how to improve them. I think the commandment I break the most often is Exodus 20:17... "You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or male or female slave, or ox, or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor."

My next-door neighbors don't own slaves, ox, or donkey (as far as I know).. but it goes way beyond that. I feel like I am constantly measuring myself up to other peoples' standards and accomplishments, and let's face it - we're bound to fall short. Or at least I do. So then I spend time worrying about what I can do and why people have things that I want and then I feel self-entitled to have more than I do.

Jacobs says that he gets jealous of little things and does things to stroke his own ego (he mentions how he checked amazon.com regularly to see how his first book, The Know-It-All, was faring on the bestseller list). This struck me as being kind of silly, but really, I don't think I'm any different.


So maybe one of my (many) post-grad plans will be to re-evaluate things and be happy with who I am, where I am, what I've done, and things along those lines. Maybe?


On a different note. I have a special blog plan for tomorrow that I stole from a different blog. STAY TUNED. 


Pictures. Well last weekend we had our area-wide program, the Block Party. I am too lazy to walk two steps to grab my external hard drive, and these are the only pictures I currently have. Though the weather could've been better, it was a lot of fun :)

JOUSTING. Believe me, it's harder than it looks.

Same goes for the Rock Climbing... 

HR photo! (at least 2/5)

After the Block Party, we had a really great HR dinner that involved margaritas and nachos. We took a couple pictures while we waited 15 minutes for Yannick to switch pants. Not. Even. Kidding. But that's for another day. My legs look like tree trunks in most of the pictures but here's a good one (HR ratio: 3/5).

ADORBS.

Alright. My goal tomorrow is to wake up at 9 (FOR REAL) so I can do a little work before RESLIFE food glory for the afternoon. I'm going to try to take some "artsy photos" so that I'll have something more for the blog.

Also, this may be self-explanatory but my blog name: rheesoo + twenty two. That's me, that's my age. And it rhymes!

The End (or the Beginning?!)

Welcome, readers! Or more accurately, hello, self!


I've had this grand idea for awhile to start blogging again. Maybe it's because I spent 45 minutes the other day looking at interior design and fashion blogs, or because I want to sort of re-live my prague blog. Either way, what better time to start than now?! Right?! It's a Wednesday night and a pretty monumental day (explained below). So here I am.


My goal with this blog is manifold, or so I think/hope. First, I want to let my many followers and fans (so basically two or three friends) know what's going on with me in the post-college world. Second, I want to blog about all sorts of things and have a creative outlet to voice my thoughts, concerns, grievances, adventures, trials and travels.. that sort of thing. Finally, starting this blog right now means that I'm not reading about John Winthrop or generally feeling sad about my college experience ending. A win-win for everyone, methinks. Plus I can include pictures of cute animals in my down time.


A little about me - talking about myself (to myself) feels awkward and vain so I'll try to intersperse this part with some fun facts as well. I'm a college senior/soon-to-be-graduate of Wesleyan University living in Middletown, CT. I've recently become pescetarian. I'm an only child. My favorite concert was Coldplay (sophomore year). This year, I've started a "eat dessert once a week" policy. I wrote a senior thesis about French representation of religion in colonial North Africa. I don't like feet. I only started eating broccoli last summer. I love public transportation. I spent nine weeks in Montana two years ago and LOVED it. I don't know how to drive. I've never had a manicure. I have perfect pitch. I've been blogging since middle school and I had no idea blogger.com had a million new layouts and choices. I usually don't type with proper capitalization in informal situations. 


That seems like enough for now.

Anyhow! I hope I can keep up blogging, even if it is just for my own sake, because it's important to reflect on things. Plus, since I won't be surrounded by brilliant Wesleyan peers, I want to continue to challenge myself mentally and intellectually by critically thinking about various issues of interest. And to post pictures of animals, as mentioned above. This is probs going to be a really wordy blog, so pictures are good.

SO. TODAY. Today was the last day of class. Ever. Or at least at Wesleyan. You know, I've been thinking about graduation for awhile so it's strange that all of these feelings are hitting me NOW. I don't quite know how to make sense of it, so I'm trying not to process it all right away. Everything is going to change, and I don't know how to feel about that quite yet. True to form, I have a TON of things to do before graduation and also things I want to do this summer. Books I want to read. People I want to see. It's going to be refreshing to be away from academia for a little bit but the future is starting to become blurry again. I was/am (?) planning on studying for the LSAT this summer and taking the test in October, but I'm starting to think that maybe I want to go to grad school again. I just got the comments back from my readers who read my thesis and I just feel like academia has such a strong pull. Then again, I went to a lecture (two, actually) yesterday that made me feel like I am just not cut out for it. Or at least not the feminist/queer theory or process theology parts. Sigh.

Okay. That's all for today. PICTURES NOW. 

me. and food. the bento box at sadako in ann arbor, michigan (fall 2010).

three of my favorite people in the whole world - and they are all college graduates now! 

(ann arbor, michigan - fall 2010).

i spent my junior spring abroad in prague. loved it, miss it (prague, spring 2010).

this was me freshman year. i still look the same? (middletown, fall 2007).

Alright, that's all for now. My photo captions aren't properly capitalized. I'm just going to leave it as is. If you know me, that's kind of a big deal because I like uniformity and whatnot. So much more to say! Including my final paper on the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) in Algeria, my desire to perhaps read Judith Butler this summer, summer plans, what I'm wearing for graduation, what the heck I did in Montana (aka a self-indulgent post with pictures from the great outdoors), and so on. Not to disappoint, here is my FAVORITE picture of puppies. Pure happiness. Until next time!